Icons and the Orthodox Tradition

Hebraic Understanding of Imagery• Waiting for the Messiah• Celebrating the earth, stewards of all things

The Alexamenos Graffito

The Incarnation Changes Everything

Where did the Iconoclasts come from?

From the East: MuslimsFrom the West: Arians

Arianism was a 4th century heresy named after Arius (c.250-336), a presbyter in Alexandria, Egypt, who taught that the Son of God was

not co-eternal and consubstantial with His Father, but rather a created being with a definite origin in time. In Arius's words, "there was [a time] when he (the Son) was not." This led to the calling of the First Ecumenical Council, which condemned it and its author

and established the Orthodox doctrine of the Holy Trinity as taught by Arius's chief opponent, St. Athanasius the Great. Though it

managed to hang on among some of the Goths and other Germanic tribes in the West, Arianism had vanished by the seventh century.

St John of Damascus

Defense of the IconsOf old, God the incorporeal and uncircumscribed was never depicted. Now,

however, when God is seen clothed in flesh, and conversing with men, I make an image of the God whom I see.

I do not worship matter, I worship the God of matter, who became matter for my sake, and deigned to inhabit matter, who worked out my salvation through matter. I will not cease from honouring that matter which works

my salvation.

I venerate it, though not as God. How could God be born out of lifeless things? And if God's body is God by union, it is immutable. The nature of

God remains the same as before, the flesh created in time is quickened by, a logical and reasoning soul.

-St. John Damascene On Holy Images

What’s with all the hands?

Triumph of GodTriumph of Orthodoxy

The Existential Encounter:The link between man and God

Inviting God into our Homes and our Lives

God’s Best Icon – YOU!

Made in the Image of God

Restoring the Image of GodFully Realizing our Created Potential