Yes, and ikons too

In my parish church for the twenty-three years I've been going there, the weekly bulletin nearly always has a full-color ikon printed on it. I collected these for the first twenty years, rescuing multiple copies off empty pews so that they would not suffer the fate to which I saw so many of them consigned by the parish staff… thrown out in the trash. It still pains me to see women fold them up and stuff them into their purses, or worse yet, even scribble notes to themselves on the same page that has the ikon print. These are all the reactions of a soul who took the meaning of ikons literally, as I was taught to, by my catechist, Fr Michael Courey, who as it turns out is now a famous ikonographer in the Greek Church. No coincidence?

But over the years I have come to see that most people mean no disrespect. To the native Orthodox, only a handpainted ikon is a real ikon; the others are only reproductions, and hence can be used to decorate everything from a church bulletin to wrapping paper to greeting cards to book covers to (gulp!) T-shirts, and even more inappropriate uses. I wrote a post once, showing ikons used as mere decorations in a rich man's drawing room.

The twenty-plus years' worth of ikons I collected from parish bulletins I have partly posted (the job wore me out, though I have scanned them all, just haven't had time to post them all) and can be found at my blog Ikonostasis.

Back to ikons. Though they are beautiful and though they remind us of divine realities, we have to remember that they are, after all, just pictures. When you forget this, people can find reasons to hate each other based on just who does and who doesn't venerate ikons. Myself, I venerate them, but in the same way I venerate the world itself, that is, the universe, and every human being I meet, as an ikon of God.

As such, I don't really approve or disapprove of anything in particular about their use, other than outright disrespect. I disapprove of disrespect, I think, more than anything else in this world.

What pains me even more than seeing someone clearing tables in the church hall dumping a paper ikon in the trash along with paper plates is, when driving home from work, seeing young men and women hopping up and down wiggling signs advertising BBQ joints or pizza carryouts or tax services at the corners of busy intersections. The image of God is to me too precious to see it reduced to such silliness, and all for money.

We live in a world where last of all human beings are respected, and the youth and the aged least of all, when the opposite should be true. Yes, I know I said the 'sh' word, should… and this time,
I really mean it!

Lord, have mercy!