All About the Light

In Mercedes, Texas, according to this KRGV report, Merced Mendoza spotted this image of Jesus on her pants and her husband was there to photograph it using his phone. As she drove, Mendoza spotted the image on her thigh. By virtue of the sun’s location, how it landed on her otherwise plain jeans and matters of physics beyond my ability to describe, the form took shape, just long enough for it to be digitized, and then submitted to the media. The Mendozas “lead a small church” and find the fleeting face a blessing that inspires them, and they hope it does the same for others.



Now to Puerto Rico and the pale winter skin of a New Yorker on vacation. Not just any New Yorker, this arm marked with a sunburn shaped like a hand belongs to my pal and the internationally acclaimed champion of charaben, Christopher D Salyers. Christopher missed out on last week’s snow, preferring to laze on a beach. He did get a little local culture in, however, including a stop in a store where he noticed a photograph of clouds shaped like hands folded in prayer. When Christopher inquired about the image (thinking of yours truly) he was told that these were believed to be the hands of God. And then, later that day this shape emerged on his arm. But, says Christopher, he neither napped nor drunkenly passed out in the sun, leaving in question the source of the unique marking.



Back in April I explored various interpretations of “hand of God” should any of you want to read up on the concept.

In both of these examples the sun was the cause. But what was the reason?

Ukraine Jesus Wall

To western Ukraine we go, to “a metallically reinforced factory wall at the Velyky Berezny township” to be exact. The wall belongs to a lumber factory, according to this Russia Today report, and it features an image of Jesus, prompting locals to pay their respects. Though, the police have also been paying close attention to the wall because “debates on the divinity of the image are often and heated, and in the multi-ethnic region – apart from Ukrainians the township is also inhabited by Rusyns, Hungarians and Slovaks – tensions may easily flare.”

It doesn’t really sound like Texas, California or Florida, does it? But fear not, technology makes the foreign familiar for all of us anymore, and this area of the Ukraine, for all of its ethnic conflicts, is no different. According to the article, many of the onlookers capture the image using, you guessed it, their mobile phones.

We all speak different languages, adhere to myriad traditions and beliefs, but in this day and age we all, no matter where in the world we reside, are accustomed to, dare I say rely on, the ability to memorialize a moment and then disseminate it using phones and other such hand-held gadgetry. I’m not complaining, too much, since my phone doesn’t have a camera. Plus, these phones definitely provide lots of Madonna of the Toast fodder. But isn’t is amazing just how these technologies level barriers of space and time, accelerating the power of the image?

Jesus & Me and My Phone Make Three

Pensacola, Florida, resident Linda Square volunteers at Englewood Coin Laundry. According to this Pensacola News Journal article, in an effort to kill time during a recent shift, she pulled out her phone and “began scrolling through the substantial library of family photos stored on the device.” Amid all of the recognizable scenes and faces, a “dark and blurry” image caught her attention. She had no idea what it was. She looked closely at the image, created on July 25, and still didn’t recognize it. Then she turned the screen so it was horizontal. That’s when things got interesting.

In the right part of the image she saw herself, and looking over her on the left side of the screen: Jesus, his face bearded, a white light over His head. Square has no recollection of taking the picture. She visited her local cell phone purveyor and asked if the company had sent her the image (which strikes me as a question you ask when you already know the answer). My guess is that the phone was in a pocket or bag and somehow got triggered to become a camera.

Do you think she was wearing this shirt when she went to the store?



Obviously, Square is proud of her discovery, finding it inspirational. She has been waiting to interview as a foster parent: "He is telling me to prepare for this . . . He's telling me to get myself together."

Of course, the best parts of this story are the t-shirt and cell phone. I understand why people like looking at photographs, whether as art or a way to remember, but I am shocked by the frequency at which I see an individual, mostly on trains and buses, but sometimes at bars, doing exactly what Square had been doing: killing time staring into a hand-held screen. The image is of such appeal to us that the easier it is to focus on it, the more we do. We have always turned to the image for meaning, as a way to understand experience, and now, too many people seem to favor the moment as memory, rather than experiencing it enough to let the moment pass before it has been memorialized.

In Square’s case, how the image came to be is another story, but her discovery of it was because she opted to look at old photos rather than stare at the tumbling colors in a dryer.

I wonder if she would stare at spinning clothes if her shirt, which says “Jesus & Me,” were in the load?

Do you think many people wear cell phone photographs on shirts?



(image from an instructables.com article about encoding data on clothing, business cards, etc.)