Does an Image Trump Location?

Jubilee Fellowship parishioner Mary Mitchum took it upon herself to give the church’s lectern a new shine. According to this Augusta Chronicle article, Mitchum stripped the old finish off and applied a new coat of varnish. As soon as she brought the lectern back to the church someone claimed to see Jesus in the wood grain: “There were two eyes, a nose, hair and maybe even a halo.”

Now, I don’t see much of anything in this photograph, but as regular readers know by now, it isn’t about what I see. What do you see? I’m guessing in this instance many of you won’t see much, but here is the story nonetheless, orbiting around in the 24-hour news cycle, a fleeting shooting star that only a handful of people may ever actually witness.

I’ve spent time in Augusta, Georgia, and even been to a church there, twice – once when my grandmother remarried and then again when she passed away, back in the mid-90s. She had moved there and on more than one occasion I spent several weeks on end in those hot, humid summers. We stayed with extended family and they had a pool so it wasn’t that bad, but those trips were the first time I realized just how different the country is depending on geography. With most of my family peppered around the northeastern part of the US, the funniest accent I had heard was an uncle’s “a”-heavy Boston speak. The drawls in Georgia can be syrupy, the same way people tend to move when the heat is at its fiercest.

Fact is, due to all sorts of circumstances, life is different in Augusta than it is in Philadelphia or Berkeley or Austin. And the same was true back when I was a kid first visiting places outside of the area where I grew up.

When I first endeavored this whole Madonna of the Toast project I had assumed that the stories would be limited in terms of geographical range. I was wrong, happily. While there are some geographic tendencies for these stories, namely areas heavily populated by Spanish-speaking populations (e.g. California, Texas), for the most part the stories favor the image over where the image is seen.

I haven’t really fleshed this idea out yet, but I haven’t thought about Augusta, Georgia, in a while either. I haven’t been back there since that funeral, yet I still have strong associations with the place. These images of Jesus and Mary seem to transcend place on some level, which I guess is the true power of iconography.

More on this once I’ve thought about it more . . .

Thinking Beyond the Visible

This year marks the 30th anniversary of the first scientific examination of the Shroud of Turin, which took place in 1978 in Turin, Italy. Photographer Barrie Schwortz, editor of Shroud.com, has spent the better part of the past 30 years talking about his experiences in relation to photographing the Shroud back in 1978 and the ongoing mystery of how it came into being, and exactly what it is. The Savannah Morning News ran a piece about him last week, and it got me thinking.

According to Schwortz’s website: “Modern science has completed hundreds of thousands of hours of detailed study and intense research on the Shroud. It is, in fact, the single most studied artifact in human history, and we know more about it today than we ever have before. And yet, the controversy still rages.”

While the image seems to have been present for quite some time, in May of 1898, photographer Secondo Pia first captured the striking black and white image on a reverse photographic plate back at the advent of photographic technology. The face appears to be that of Jesus, and the story is that this is the cloth provided by Joseph of Arimathea to cover His body when He was entombed. One set of carbon dating data suggests that the Shroud dates back to the 13th or 14 centuries, debunking the Jesus theory, though subsequent studies claim that the portion of the cloth used for testing was not an original swatch of the material. The mystery remains unsolved.

The Shroud of Turin debate isn’t a typical Madonna of the Toast story in that this visual manifestation was caused by one of two things: people creating a hoax, or the face of Jesus. But, it does drive home the persuasive power of such imagery. This object in particular seems to have transcended the physical question of what it actually is, now representing a divine, mystical example of how the visual inspires faith and intrigue.

As Schwortz says in the article, “You can't be involved in something like this without confronting your own religious beliefs.” Even if you don’t have religious beliefs, these stories catch your attention and can get your imagination going, and that is, after all, the point.

Virgin Mary Workbench

This latest spotting of the Virgin Mary comes to us from Coweta, Georgia. According to this The Times-Herald report, the image appeared on a workbench that had been used earlier in the day by Mark Jersey. Mark’s hobby is car restoration, but he also does temporary tattoos at parties. After using the workbench for his supplies so he could apply temporary tattoos at a birthday party, he left it in the back of his pickup truck once he was home. Later, it began to rain so “Mark got the paint-spattered work table out of his pickup and propped it against a glass-paned French door.” Julie, his wife, didn’t know this, so when she walked past the door, the house’s lights and the dark of night outside created the effect of a face peering in through the glass. Julie screamed for her husband.



There’s no doubt about it, the rain caused the paint to run and dry like a face, which does have a very feminine quality, especially in the lips. Both Mark and Julie have Christian backgrounds, so associating the image with the Virgin Mary isn’t a great leap, though Julie conceded that “You hear about these things, but never expect it to happen to you . . . We’re not sure what it is, but it’s really been fun to have it around.” So fun, in fact, the couple have invited friends over to take a look and the workbench will be next to the Christmas tree this year.

Thanks to reporter Alex McRae for the pics!