'Monastery Icons' Crucifix

[Philothei]

I believe that the straight (rather than slanty) third bar designates it as a Eastern-Rite Catholic cross rather than an Orthodox one, but aside from that I would use the same protocol as for other items from Mona-scary Icons.

yeah Mona scary icons are banned from many churches. The one we were before, Thekla will rememberbetter, we fought hard to ban them... and we did it, (from the church bookstore) for some time, but unfortunately not all people are well informed like you guys here. I agree and I am pleased to see that they are not accepted generally. I always thought we were too picky...lol...

I think some people even gave the icons away before they were blessed...

God bless,
Philothei

 

[MariaRegina]

Statues and crucifixes "in the round" are frowned on by the Orthodox Church and generally most priests will not bless such objects.

Certain priests try to accommodate new believers hoping that gradually they will put aside their Catholic beliefs and fully embrace Orthodoxy. This particular woman considered herself a refugee from Vatican II Catholic abuse of the liturgy, etc. So, when she found a traditionalist Catholic priest who broke with Cardinal Mahony's church, she left Orthodoxy, joined the traditional Catholics, and divorced her husband. It was tragic.

 

[E.C.]

Attempts to make a union between Orthodoxy and Hinduism.

What about this tells you it will not work at all?

Seriously, what kind of person would be driven to think up such an impossible bond?

 

[Philothei]

Certain priests try to accommodate new believers hoping that gradually they will put aside their Catholic beliefs and fully embrace Orthodoxy. This particular woman considered herself a refugee from Vatican II Catholic abuse of the liturgy, etc. So, when she found a traditionalist Catholic priest who broke with Cardinal Mahony's church, she left Orthodoxy, joined the traditional Catholics, and divorced her husband. It was tragic.

I knew a priest that blessed the Lady of Quadaloupe icon but this is the first time I heard about statues...

I do not think many priests would be compeled to do that for any reason especially "accomodating" any practices that are so foreign (to say at least!) to our tradition.

As far as the lady involved I think it can happen to anyone. This is the reason it is important not to get baptized or chrismated in "a hurry". I think the
spiritual fathers should be more careful to evaluate if a person is converting for the right reasons. There are many examples out there of people who converted for their spouse and when they got divorced they left the church.

God bless,
P.

 

[Michael G]

Certain priests try to accommodate new believers hoping that gradually they will put aside their Catholic beliefs and fully embrace Orthodoxy. This particular woman considered herself a refugee from Vatican II Catholic abuse of the liturgy, etc. So, when she found a traditionalist Catholic priest who broke with Cardinal Mahony's church, she left Orthodoxy, joined the traditional Catholics, and divorced her husband. It was tragic.

Since when does the end justify the means? Since when can you say "this is my intent, so thus I am going to go against the age old teaching of the Church that statues are borderline idolatry just so I can accomodate this one person who is having a hard time fully accepting Orthodoxy?" Any priest who would do such a thing clearly is in the wrong. They obviously have not read the Church fathers very much at all.

 

[MichaelNZ]

Statues and crucifixes "in the round" are frowned on by the Orthodox Church and generally most priests will not bless such objects.

Our church has a Western-style Crucifix on the Left side of the sanctuary/altar. It has a 3D sculpted corpus. My priest blessed a Western Crucifix for me to use in my icon corner. However, there's no Orthodox supply shop in my city, and the closest I can get to an Orthodox Crucifix is a St. Damian one (which I bought for my girlfriend).

 

[Khaleas]

A lot of the priest blessing crosses are fairly Western Crucifix looking...

 

[cassc]

to quote a line from a Veggie Tales video, "God is bigger than the Boogie Man . . ." Once your priest has blessed the icon, any false ceremony is broken, any demonic presence flees. Do not be concerned. Do not discard that which is now made holy.

"Do not consider anything unclean that God has declared clean" Acts 10:15

 

[Vasya Davidovich]

Like anyone else serving Christ, not all iconographers are as pious as others. I remember a priest in my area criticizing the iconographer who painted many of the new icons our church commissioned over the past few years, including some very nice huge ones, because she smoked cigarettes while painting, which I assume was being used to suggest that she lacked spiritual piety, but I do not believe that is my business. Perhaps employing the most worthy individuals for all business transactions we make is a good policy, but the icons, nonetheless, are beautiful and witness to me the realities of heaven and the great cloud of witness present in the temple when we worship. The icon you have there is beautiful too.

Random thoughts.

I know a local parish that has had icons put on the walls in recent years, adorning an otherwise fairly barren temple. Of the iconographers who wrote/painted these icons, one was a chain-smoking priest-iconographer, and the other two (a Russian iconographer and his non-Christian apprentice) were widely presumed to be involved in a homosexual relationship.

At some level, one would think that it might be best to find a deep, prayerful quasi-monastic man of God to write/paint these icons.

Best case scenario: the icons would be luminous and would convey something of the divine.
Worst case scenario: it would avoid all scandal, and the appearance of scandal.

- Vasya.

 

[E.C.]

At some level, one would think that it might be best to find a deep, prayerful quasi-monastic man of God to write/paint these icons.

That's why I'd say either buy it from a monastery or buy it from a place that bought it from a monastery. Either way, have it blessed (next item on list: get icons blessed!)