Detail Apollo Seated With A Lyre. 18th.century. Charles Andre Van Loo French 1705-1765. Oil/canvas. 

Matthias Stom  (1600 – 1652)

The Incredulity of Saint Thomas (detail) 1640–1649

St. Michael and the dragon

While this took me a whole lot of time to finish, I am very pleased with the end result, both compositionally and in regard to the colour scheme.

The idea for the ornate, white armour in particular came from an illustration of St. Michael in the book of hours of Henry IV of France, which looks like this:

Also, fun-fact: my hometown celebrates an annual little festival, which as its centre piece features a moving mechanical figure of St. Michael slaying the devil, the colour-scheme of which I also referenced for this painting.

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Close-ups:

Athena holding Achilles back in the agora, first chant

Michelangelo Anselmi - Apollo and Marsyas. Detail. 1540

PARMIGIANINO Diana and Actaeon (Details) 1523-24 Fresco Rocca Sanvitale, Fontanellato

just heard the news about the Pope.

Eternal Rest grant unto him O Lord, and may Your Perpetual Light shine upon him.

God allowed him one more Easter with the people before calling him home to the Risen Lord ❤️‍🩹

So I’ve been in Rome the last few days …

My beloved

Illustration by Ernst Stohr, from 'Ver Sacrum' Magazine, 1899

I just feel like it's very important to talk about the bad shit, too.

That you might face difficulties on your path, that there will be hours-days-weeks-months of silence - or can be, at the very least - and that religion won't come as a panacea for every issue or as a magical pill. You might still feel lost, and hurt, and scared, and lonely; and you might still hold faith. Not that you should, it's up to you. But the point is, "having faith" is not a synonym to "never having anything bad happen, ever" while encountering issues of any degree is not necessarily a proof of an uncaring God.

This post is for the person who grew up learning no one would help them so they had to do things on their own, who doesn't want to burden people with their problems, who feels like they should be able to handle things on their own, who is having a hard time, who is depressed, who feels alone and like the Gods are far away.

Sometime we're the ones who put that distance between ourselves and the Gods without even realizing it. It can feel silly to pray sometimes, especially if it's over something we think isn't a big deal, but They still want to hear from us, especially if we're struggling.