Catholic Easter special: Western Sun
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We now return to our weekly posting schedule, and to non-Celtic content.
Our fourteenth Spring Vignettes piece celebrates Catholic Easter, which will be celebrated by Roman Catholics and many Protestants on April 9th this year, according to the Gregorian Calendar.
Before you read what the piece was intended to portray, share what it portrays to _you_. I’m just the artist; you’re the beholder.
Leave a comment.
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Other than that rabbits are a symbol of fecundity, life, and birth, there’s no particular symbolism in the body of this piece; it’s just an idyllic pastoral scene with some cute bun-buns.
Baby rabbits of some wild species ordinarily have little forehead-stars (or “milk-spots”) that fade as they mature. I thought it would be very neat if a litter of baby rabbits had gold, silver, and copper forehead-stars, instead of the usual white.
Are these special rabbits? Is their birth an omen of great events? Will they grow up to be extraordinary rabbits who do extraordinary things? We just don’t know.
Many rabbits make nests at ground-level using their own beard-fur, which female rabbits grow specially for the purpose. Rabbits normally leave their babies alone for much of the day and night, and return to nurse at dawn and dusk, when it’s safest. If you find unattended baby rabbits, it’s likely that they haven’t been abandoned; they’re just lying low until their mommy returns.
The frame is inspired by Roman architecture, especially the Roman Pantheon; which was built in antiquity as a pagan temple, but was repurposed as a Christian church later in its history.
If you look closely at the repeating pattern on the lintel, you’ll notice that I very cleverly integrated St. Peter’s Cross.
According to Christian tradition, St. Peter was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus of Nazareth, regarded by Christians as an incarnation of the God of Abraham and spiritual savior of humankind. Originally named Simon, he was renamed Cephas (כֵּיפָא Kepha), Aramaic for “Stone”, by Jesus; and this name was translated into Greek as Petros (Πέτρος), the Greek word for “Stone”.
Simon and his brother Andrew were fishermen when Jesus was preaching on the Sea of Galilee. According to the Gospel of Luke, Jesus demonstrated his divinity by calling up a miraculous catch of fish when the nets were coming up empty. Jesus called Simon and Andrew to be “fishers of men”; and they became his apostles, preaching his teachings to the people.
After returning to Rome at a time when Christians were being persecuted by pagan Emperor Nero, Peter was sentenced to crucifixion; and by some accounts, he asked not to be crucified in the same way as Jesus, as he thought himself unworthy. He was crucified upside-down on an inverted cross; and the inverted cross is known as St. Peter’s Cross to this day.
Roman Catholics regard Peter as the foremost of the apostles and the founder of the Roman See, to whom the Pope, as Bishop of Rome, is the direct successor as leader of Christianity.