#Roman Saint

[portraitsofsaints]

Saint Longinus the Centurion Died: 1st century Feast Day: October 16 (new) March 15 (trad.) Patronage: the blind and those with poor eyesight, for discernment, Mantua

Saint Longinus was the centurion that pierced the side of Jesus at the Crucifixion. He was losing his eyesight at the time and when Christ’s blood fell into his eyes his sight was restored. He then said, “Indeed, this man was the Son of God.” (Mark 15:39) Subsequently, he received instructions from the apostles, converted, left the army, and became a monk. He was arrested, tortured (teeth pulled out and tongue cut out yet could still speak clearly), and martyred. His relics are in Rome and his lance is contained in one of the four pillars over the altar in the Basilica of St. Peter’s.

Prints, holy cards, and plaques are available for purchase here:{website}

[hippi3kat94]

Valentine's Day: A Dark History

A brief history of the most romantic holiday.

Valentines Day, the auspicious day of love and joy. For many it means flowers, gifts, and candy. For some it means a night by themselves eating chocolate and admiring the flowers after listening to Miley Cyrus’ new hit single on repeat. Okay, just one more time. But is Valentine’s Day even a real holiday? Is Cupid real? Some scoff at its genuine as a traditional holiday and some feel that it…

[idylls-of-the-divine-romance]

My friend's dad was murdered. Please please please pray for her.

[of-spaceships-and-cats]

So... I FINALLY WAS ABLE TO MAKE SOME ART FOR THE AMAZING FIC "Of Saints and Sinners" by @morningstarwrites. That chair scene (and every single Radioapple moment) in the latest chapter absolutely demolished me!

[but-how-do-you-drive]

"Wash the plate not because it is dirty nor because you are told to wash it, but because you love the person who will use it next."

- St. Teresa of Calcutta

[otsmosis]

doodles from the latest chapter of @morningstarwrites's fic, Of Saints and Sinners, aka im crazy.

[artthatgivesmefeelings]

Gerard van Honthorst (Dutch, 1592-1656) Saint Sebastian, ca.1623 Sebastian was a Roman centurion, who was discovered to be a Christian and was sentenced to death by Emperor Diocletian. He was bound to a stake and shot with arrows. He was left for dead, although the arrows had not killed him and he was eventually stoned to death. The story is taken from the 'Golden Legend'.

[7pleiades7]

The Three Graces (1813-1816) by Antonio Canova (Italian, 1757-1822), marble, h: 1.8 m, Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg

[romans-art]

Celestine the Living Saint

[illustratus]

Saint Longinus - St Peter's Basilica, Vatican City

by Gian Lorenzo Bernini

[littleflowerfaith]

Immaculate Heart of Mary pray for us

Sacred Heart of Jesus have mercy on us

[portraitsofsaints]

Saint Agnes of Rome 291 - 304 Feast Day: January 21 Patronage: Betrothed couples, chastity

St. Agnes was a Roman girl who was only twelve or thirteen years old when she suffered martyrdom for her Faith. Agnes made a promise to God never to stain her purity. When the Prefect Sempronius wished Agnes to marry his son and she refused, he condemned her to death. She is one of seven women, excluding the Blessed Virgin, commemorated by name in the Canon of the Mass. She is the patron saint of chastity, gardeners, girls, engaged couples, rape victims, and virgins. {website}

[apenitentialprayer]

i know that as a catholic you just have to believe with what the church says but i really dont like the belief of the original sin, i feel like its such a horrible thing to believe about yourself and about other human beings too

There are actually ways of legitimately dissenting from less essential Church teachings in a way that leaves you in good standing with the Church; I'm not sure if Original Sin is one of those things, though, to be honest.

But, anon, I'm going to offer another perspective here, starting from a quote (perhaps ironically?) from my favorite heretic. One of the things that James Carroll believes is that Original Sin has been given a bad wrap. In Constantine's Sword, he says:

I referred to Augustine’s assertion of the idea that the human condition implies a perennial state of finitude, weakness, and sin, all of which will be overcome, even for the Church, only with the end of time. [...] Augustine is thus regarded as the father of a severe, flesh-hating, sin-obsessed theology, but that dark characterization misses the point of his insight. His honest admission of the universality of human woundedness is a precondition for both self-acceptance and the forgiveness of the other, which for Augustine always involved the operation of God’s grace, God’s gift. Only humans capable of confronting the moral tragedy of existence, matched to God’s offer of repairing grace, are capable of community, and community is the antidote to human woundedness. Augustine sensed that relationship as being at the heart of God, and he saw it as being at the heart of human hope, too. This is a profoundly humane vision.

I wish I had understood the spirit of this quote when I was in high school. I remember learning in my World History class that Islam teaches that all children are born good, and then the world makes them evil. And I remember my teacher asking how that compares with Christianity, and I raised my hand and said that Christianity teaches that all of us are born evil. Because I believed that at the time. And, really, the whole framing of that question was wrong and gave really simplistic representations of what Islam and Christianity teaches, but I don't think we're alone in having internalized that understanding, anon. And that's a shame.

I thin it's important to remember the worldview that the doctrine of Original Sin is actively defending us against; there was an idea, that gets called "Pelagianism" (the poor guy it got named after may not even have believed it), that said that humans were capable of being saved on their own, by their own power. Someone on this site recently asked what people's thoughts on Pelagianism were, so you can read my thoughts here. But to keep it short and sweet, I think Original Sin is an important doctrine because it saves you from the need to be perfect.

There are ways to treat Original Sin that I think are certainly unhealthy, and I think the doctrine can be a source of anxiety and fear. But I also think, very deeply, that Original Sin should be a reason why we treat ourselves and especially our neighbor with kindness and understanding. I can look at myself and say "What I do, I do not understand. For I do not do what I want, but I do what I hate. […] For I do not do the good that I want, but I do the evil I do not want" (Romans 7:15, 19). And I can say that because I know I am ontologically wounded; that all of us have our weaknesses. That while we may still be in the moral wrong for committing a morally wrong action, our wills are compromised in a way that causes us to incline towards the comfortable and the easy rather than the good.

I wish I could go back in time and tell that class that Christianity does not teach that people are born evil. I wish I could go back and tell them that it teaches that we are born in a state of dis-integration, that we are wounded beings yearning for wholeness; alienated beings seeking everlasting belonging; beings lost in darkness, seeking the light. But I can say it now: the doctrine of Original Sin doesn't have to be an occasion to think you're depraved and without value, but it can be an invitation to come to terms with your own woundedness, because doing that (to use the words of Lutheran theologian Nancy Eiesland) "opens a space for the inflowing of grace and acceptance."

[saintejeannedefrance]

Immaculate Heart of Mary,

Pray for us!

[pol-ski]

The Image of the Divine Mercy - Jesus, I trust in You (1943) by Adolf Hyła (Polish, 1897–1965)

The image of the Divine Mercy is a depiction of Jesus Christ that is based on the devotion initiated by Saint Faustina Kowalska.

Adolf Hyła paint­ed this ver­sion of the Divine Mer­cy for the Congregation of the Sisters of Our Lady of Mercy in Kraków, as a votive offer­ing in grat­i­tude for the safe­ty of his fam­i­ly dur­ing World War II.

[taxidermychrist]

& god is equally weird about me // design available as a sticker here <3

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