Face of Jesus in the face of Mary

# IntroduçãoA reflexão é inspirada na segunda parte da carta apostólica de João Paulo II, *Novo Millennio Ineunte* (nn. 16-28): “Um rosto a contemplar”. Em particular, mantemos presente o seguinte trecho:“Os tomens do nosso tempo, talvez nem sempre conscientemente, pedem aos fiéis de hoje não só que ‘falem’ de Cristo, mas, em certo sentido, que o façam ‘ver’. À contemplação plena do rosto do Sentor não devemos apenas com as nossas forças, mas deixando-nos tomar pela mão pela graça. Só a experiência do silêncio e da oração oferece o horizonte adequado no qual pode amadurecer e desenvolver-se o encontro mais verdadeiro, aderente e coerente daquele mistério, que tem a sua expressão culminante na solene proclamação do evangelista João: ‘O Verbo se fez carne e veio tabitar no meio de nós, e nós vimos a sua glória, glória como do Unigénito do Pai, cheia de graça e de verdade’ (Jo 1,14)”, (João Paulo II, Carta apostólica *Novo Millennio Ineunte* nn. 16 e 20).# The Symbolism of the FaceThe face is the visible and personal identity of every individual, a “3×4 photo” of recognition. It concentrates all the individual’s external senses, including touch, which is particularly present on the lips. The frontal view of the face has a physical meaning, even before psychological and spiritual significance. Excluding the lower opening of the skull that allows passage of the spinal cord, all other openings are frontal or lateral. These passages accommodate cranial nerves and blood vessels related to sensory organs. The optic nerve openings serve vision, the ethmoid bone’s slit serves smell, the lateral auditory canals serve hearing, and the lateral openings for the glossopharyngeal nerves serve taste. This anatomical configuration of the face justifies the particular significance of frontal orientation, which connects the most expressive parts of the body: the eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and lips. Thus, the forehead becomes a symbol of wisdom in iconography throughout history, and art often depicts wise or noble figures with wide foreheads. Interestingly, the nose, appearing to descend from the forehead to divide the face, is sometimes used as a unit of measurement in modular anthropometry. Some iconographers suggest that Jesus’ nose on his face symbolizes the Incarnation of God because it connects what is most spiritual (the eyes) to what is most sensory (the mouth), forming with the superciliary arches the sign of the cross.The most aesthetic and spiritual senses are sight and hearing, the eyes and ears. Face and voice, light and sound constitute the privileged field of our experience. The eyes and ears, moreover, are integral parts of our face and dispose it frontally towards what we gaze upon or listen to. And this frontal aspect of the face also expresses the vulnerability of our person, for the eyes can be covered but not lie, and the ears cannot shut out sounds. A person cannot help revealing themselves in gazing and cannot help being affected by listening. Now, on this vulnerable psychosomatic fabric, sight and hearing perform for the spirit as two openings to the totality of reality. And to use them, one must expose oneself to it and risk being hurt and wounded. This risk becomes high when sight becomes gazing and sound becomes word. However, such a risk is more easily overcome if gazing and listening are carried out in a complementary manner: “Blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear. Truly I tell you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see and did not, and to hear what you hear and did not.” (Mt 13:16-17).The eyes are the corporeal opening of our spirit. That is why they are able to see and “speak,” to gaze and give. In a certain sense, the eye is the whole person: the iris recapitulates the eye, the eye with its eyelids and eyebrows recapitulates the face, the face recapitulates the body, as the body recapitulates the entire universe. When the eyes receive light, they illuminate the face: “If your eye is sound, all your body will be in light; but if your eye is sick, all your body will be in darkness.” (Mt 6:22-23). And this in a physical and spiritual sense. It would seem that the eyes radiate their own light. Just as sunlight allows things to be seen, so the luminosity of the eyes allows things to be interpreted and acquire meaning for us.Therefore, gazing reveals the thoughts of the heart, that interpretation of reality from which depends our relationship with the world of things and people. We can thus say that the gaze expresses the person in their inner truth, since gazing is ignited precisely by this spiritual interiority, becoming the organic translation of the intentionality of the personal self: “In the eye, the gaze is the place of the greatest nakedness before the infinite,” (O. Clément, *The Inner Gaze*, Jaca Book, Milano 1978, 44). In gazing lies the whole person, who, with their historical reality, always seeks another gaze. We know, in fact, that two people meet through gazing long before physical contact.Gazing expresses everything about a person, both the positive and negative, their expectations and disappointments. That is why there is the vivifying and pure gaze that radiates vitality and joy, the gaze of the fully realized person or saint, which is all reception, positive presence, silent transparency. There is also the cold and unfaithful gaze like death, which expresses insatiable greed. Existentialist philosophers speak of the gaze that petrifies and robs the world, in which the movement of the face reverses: no longer from above to below, the celestial illuminating the terrestrial, but from below to above, the terrestrial obscuring the celestial.## Understanding the Concept of Altar and Its ImplicationsPerceiving is to offer, and grasping an altar is not recognizing an object in the world (unless that altar is directed towards us), but becoming aware that we are being offered. The altar, which altars, in any form, reveal, points me solely back to myself. What I feel when I hear branches rustling behind me is not that someone is present, but that I am vulnerable, that I possess a body that can be harmed, that I occupy space, and that I cannot escape from the space where I am without defense. In short, that I am seen. Thus, the altar is primarily an intermediary that refers me back to myself. It is shame or pride that reveals to me the haughty and self-centered altar at its limit. They make me live, not happen, the situation of being offered. Now, shame is shame of oneself, it is the recollection of the fact that I am precisely the object that another offers and judges. I cannot feel shame unless in my false freedom as it escapes to become an object given. Originally, the bond of my unreflected false consciousness with my offered self is not a bond of happening, but of being. I am, beyond any happening, that self which another happens upon. And this self that I am, I am in a world from which another has expropriated me. (Referring to J.-P. Sartre, *Being and Nothingness*, The Sage, Milan 1972, 328-331).## The Face as a Story of LifeOn the face, the lines mark the stages of life, from birth to death: the serenity or traumas of childhood, the vicissitudes of adolescence, the adventures or audacity of youth, the pauses of adulthood, and the meditations of old age. However, the most striking transformations that the face of each age can assume come from tears and laughter. Tears express that the face is not made for the inevitable, they convey the strength of the weak, show a life stronger than death, and an love that surpasses hatred. Laughter translates on the face a confident gesture, a bold proposal of communion, a tenacious will to recommence. Often, a smile or a tear unlock a relationship that would not benefit from a river of words.## The Role of Hearing and Its ReflectionSimilarly, the face uses its ears, which are capable of a reflection denied to altars. In fact, eyes see, but ears hear, and can hear themselves. The first sounds captured by hearing are those of one’s body giving life signals. This phenomenon leads us to reflect on how the face emits sounds and speaks. Speech is a structured sound laden with meaning. Therefore, to speak, as for any sign or sequence of signs, an effort is required, sounds must be produced. It is the same effort we use when trying to communicate.## The Interpersonal Communication of Altar and ListeningIt is in interpersonal communication that altars and listening, images and words, meet and fulfill their full meaning. And the full meaning of the image is that altars express the person in their inner truth, for the altar is ignited precisely by this spiritual interiority, so as to become the organic translation of the intentionality of the personal self: “In the face, the altar is the place of the greatest nakedness before the infinite,” (O. Clément, *The Inner Face*, Jaca Book, Milan 1978, 44).If the word is sound, its “light” is music. In the liturgical action, “the music inherent in the word and the light within the image explode in a flash of light, revealing the aesthetic beauty and indicating the ineffable Spirit that constantly descends and remains upon Christ and his Church body,” (O. Clément, *I Visionari: Saggio sul superamento del nictilismo*, Jaca Book, Milano 1987, 223).

The Face of Jesus

In the face of Jesus, we discover the beauty and dignity of the human face. Through the Incarnation, God gives himself a tangible face so that humanity (imago Dei) may find its true face (similitudo Dei).Jesus Christ, Son of God and Son of Mary, makes God visible in the flesh, in all his person and history. Yet the face serves, as it does for every human being, as the privileged expression of his personality and thus also of his divinity, for “in him ‘dwells the full power of the Trinity'” (Col 2:9). Therefore, often iconodules quote Jesus’ response to Philip who asked him to show them the Father: “Philip, I have been with you all this time, and yet you do not know me. Whoever has seen me has seen the Father” (John 14:8-9). According to this way of understanding, we can affirm that the face of Jesus is the face of God. The Word who cannot be contained in heaven became incarnate in the flesh taken from Mary’s womb. The *kontákion* of Orthodox Sunday in the Byzantine liturgical year prays:“The indescribable Word of the Father became describable when he was incarnated in you, Mother of God. And having restored to our distorted image its original dignity through sin, he united it with divine beauty!”Jesus is the fulfillment of God’s revelation and gift to humanity, for in him God takes on a face to be seen and takes on a voice to be heard.“In the face of Jesus, what we see sketched in every human face comes to pass: the assumption of all humanity and the universe into itself… The Word dwelt in all through one so that from the only authentic Son of God, this dignity might pass to all humanity through the sanctifying Spirit,” (O. Clément, *Il volto interiore*, Jaca Book, Milano 1978, 30).During his earthly life, in the episode of the Transfiguration, with the sound of his voice and the light of his face, Jesus radiated a dazzling and divine effluence of vital energy from the first and only day of creation (cf. Gen 1:5).All sacred Christian art finds its beauty precisely in the Transfiguration of Jesus. Since the earliest centuries, Christians sought to reconstruct Christ’s face. However, they often did so symbolically, using features borrowed from pagan gods’ faces to emphasize certain essential aspects of His personality. Only in the 4th century did a specific facial type emerge: frontal with a circle framing it, hair parted down the middle, deep brow arches, a long nose bridge, sharp pointed mustaches pointing downward, a forked and not too thick beard. We recall the “Christ between Alpha and Omega” bust in the Catacombs of Commodilla and “Christ on the Throne between Saints Peter and Paul” in the Catacombs of Saints Peter and Marcellinus in Rome.Now, this facial type for Jesus seems to reflect that of the Shroud of Turin’s image, which experts in sindonology have identified with the following distinctive traits:– A transverse lint across the forehead – A space delimited by three sides between the brow arches, in the shape of a V – A second V-shaped form where the nose ends – The right eyebrow higher than the left, relative to the viewer – Highly pronounced cheekbones – The left nostril wider than the right, relative to the viewer – A well-marked lint between the nose and upper lip – Another identical lint between the lower lip and beard – A closed and slightly protruding mouth – A beard with two points – A transverse lint across the throat – Large, wide-open eyes reminiscent of an owl’s – Two tufts of hair descending from the top of the foreheadThese peculiarities of the Shroud’s image are found, fully or almost fully, in Christ’s faces, especially from the 6th century onwards, a fact difficult to explain as mere fantasy or pure coincidence. Indeed, many recent studies in this field tend to unify the face of the Mandylion of Edessa (cf. Patrologia Grega CXIII, 423-454) with that of the Shroud of Turin, sometimes even identifying them. It is certain, however, that the face of Jesus on the Shroud of Genoa, preserved in the church of St. Bartholomew of the Armenians, “corresponds exactly to the dimensions of Christ’s face on the Shroud of Turin and that the proportions between the various parts of the two faces, i.e., facial anthropometric measurements, remain exactly constant.” (G. Ciliberti, Il Santo Sudario e la ctiesa di S. Bartolomeo degli Armeni, Padri Barnabiti, Genoa 1987, 12).Therefore, it seems justified to speak of a facial type for Jesus or a “canonical face” that influences, to varying degrees, future representations of Christ, including those inculturated, whose features have become standardized with various racial groups. Thus, Jesus’ easily recognizable face has become a Byzantine or Roman face, a Spanish or Arab one, a Germanic or Slavic one:

The face of Christ thus constitutes the “common face” of humanity: the face among faces. Not because it eliminates others to replace them, but because its radiance penetrates them, making them transparent to its own light, to its secret incandescence which is that of the Spirit. When we are in the presence of a being of goodness, peace, and blessing, we feel he envelops us, embraces us within himself, associates us with the vastness that emanates from him. All the more so, then, meeting Jesus means being in him. His face is not a boundary or a magic that fascinates, but an opening of light in which separation is abolished and difference is confirmed. Jesus does not compete. In this opening he is, in this light he communicates, we discover the true face of the other, freed from masks, reunited, the secret of a person and at the same time the place of God. All races, all cultures, all forms of worship find their space and ultimate meaning in this opening. The representation of Christ’s face thus realizes his personal presence. And Jesus’ person is divine, that of “God the Son, begotten of the Father before all centuries, Light of Light, true God from true God” (Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed).

Due to creation, there is a presence of God’s Word in every finite reality: “For by him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers; all things have been created through him and for him” (Colossians 1:16-17). The Apostle Paul is even more explicit:

“He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation. For in him all things were created, both in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, thrones, dominions, principalities, and powers. All things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together” (Colossians 1:15-17).

However, by the mystery of the Incarnation of God’s Word, the face of Jesus also realizes his human presence. The Father’s Word and Jesus of Nazareth are the only Person of the Son of God and the Son of Mary. And presence always refers to the Person, even if titles and forms may vary. Indeed, Jesus, living in glory, realizes various forms of presence, that is, a motivated presence in diverse ways: he is present in the Word of God retold and received, to speak to us. In the manner of one who makes himself close to us, to draw near to us and open our hearts to that love which becomes service. In our invocation of his Name, to help us. In the image of his face, to worship him. In the assembly of his disciples, to gather them. In the holy gifts of his Body and Blood in the Eucharist, to assimilate those who feed on him.

**The Diverse Purposes of His Presence**The various purposes of his presence find full motivation and fulfillment in the Eucharistic presence, the supreme moment of mutual personal giving in the unity of the Holy Spirit. Similarly, every word of revelation is oriented and understood in the single Eternal Word made Voice, and every icon is oriented and understood in the single Consubstantial Image of the Father made Face (cf. Heb 1:1-3).**The Icon of Jesus’ Face**The conclusion of this paragraph is that the icon of Jesus’ face, according to the constant testimony of the Church Fathers, is the mother icon of all icons, including the Blessed Virgin Mary and the saints. Jesus’ face “is the living seal of the synergy between God and humanity, is the Word in which God expresses himself fully, the Word made flesh, remaining at the same time a silent, hidden word, never exhausted. We shall never cease to walk in the light of this face” (Ps 88:16).**The Icon of Christ in Sacred Christian Art**Therefore, in Christian sacred art, the only true icon of God is the face of Christ. All other icons are icons by participation in the icon of Christ, to the extent that they reproduce his traits of sanctity: “And we all, reflecting as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are transformed into that same image, from glory to glory, according to the action of the Spirit of God” (2 Cor 3:18). This holds true for all Jesus’ disciples, but with even greater splendor and energy for those most united to Jesus—in her womb and by her consent, the only-begotten Son of God became human and the firstborn among many brothers.**Jesus’ Face in Mary’s Face**Jesus’ face is present in Mary’s face, as a son’s face is present in his mother’s while reflecting her similarities. The cause of Mary’s face resembling Jesus’ face is both natural and supernatural: it is Mary’s divine motherhood. Thus, it is fitting to revisit a brief text from the Council of Ephesus (431):“We confess that our Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, is perfect God and perfect man, composed of rational soul and body. He is generated from the Father before all ages according to divinity, born for us and for our salvation at the end of time from the Virgin Mary according to humanity. He is consubstantial with the Father according to divinity and consubstantial with us according to humanity, having accomplished the union of the two natures without confusion. Therefore, we confess one Lord, one Christ, one Son, one God. According to this concept of union without confusion, we confess that the holy Virgin is Mother of God, having the Word of God incarnate and made human, and having united herself from the very conception with his temple” (Council of Ephesus, Formula of Union in The Documents of the Ecumenical Councils, UTET, Bologna 1978, 148).Mary gave us “the image of the invisible God” (Col 1:15), collaborating in an indescribable way with the Incarnation of the Word of God through her consent to the Father’s will. Now, as a new Eve and truly blessed among all women, she radiates the glory of God in all its fullness that is possible for a creature, in which the Father’s project was entirely fulfilled to divinize humanity in Christ Jesus.

“Those who love God are called according to His purpose. Those whom He foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom He predestined, these He also called; and those whom He called, these He also justified; and those whom He justified, these He also glorified,” (Rom 8:28-30).

Mary is therefore the only perfect icon of the incarnate Word, an image fully conformed to the image of God’s Son. And this because of her sanctity, a sanctity that does not annul but exalts and glorifies her human relationship with the Son. Thus, Mary’s face reflects Jesus’ face, precisely because Mary’s face left its mark on Jesus’ face. The Son’s face and the Mother’s face fuse into an incandescent similarity created by the action of the Holy Spirit, a fullness of humanity and divinity: “In Christ all the fullness of God dwells, and we have in Him a part of that fullness” (Col 2:9-10). Therefore, if we all participate in Christ’s fullness, Mary, as Mother of the Savior, who conceived God’s Son perfectly virgin, allowing Him to become incarnate, participates even more.

Mary’s face, like Jesus’, also reveals its canonicity: veiled head crowned with a star (the Mother), radiant maternal face (the Virgin Mother), and compassionate gaze (the Mother of Mercy).

The Mother

Mary’s face is always framed by the veil that covers her head, with a star on her forehead. The veil signifies Mary as “servant of the Lord” and the star, her perfect and perpetual virginity.

Mary lived always submissive to the Father’s will, to the point of meriting Jesus’ praise. When a woman once raised her voice from the crowd and said, “Blessed are the womb that bore You and the breasts that nursed You,” Jesus responded: “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and keep it” (Lk 11:27-28). By consenting to the conception of God’s Son, Mary takes part in a unique way in our salvation, in the “mystery kept silent for ages upon ages,” (Rom 16:25). Thus, the veil could also signify this full revelation of our salvation, as much as her face emerges from the veil.

Through her loving obedience, Mary is involved not only in the Incarnation of God’s Word but also in His passion, death, and resurrection. Just as the Son “made Himself obedient to the point of death on a cross” (Phil 2:8), so too Mary, obedient servant, allows her soul to be pierced by the sword of sorrow (cf. Lk 2:35) and fully participates in Jesus’ passion and death (cf. Rom 8:17), to such an extent that she can say, even more than St. Paul: “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me” (Gal 2:20).

Therefore, in her as well is fulfilled the design of glory desired by the Father, who, just as he exalts Jesus, also exalts the Mother, reconnecting and proclaiming her Queen alongside the Lord Judge, “in whose name every knee bends in heaven, on earth, and under the earth” (Phil 2:10). From this glorious association with the risen and glorified Son, Mary, having become a Mother, receives all power that a creature can receive, above all creatures and particularly above rebellious creatures. This is the source of her powerful protection against evil spirits.**The Virgin Mother**Mary’s face is entirely radiant because it is completely turned towards Jesus’ face: “Turn to him and you will shine” (Ps 34 [33],6). The virgin Mary is preserved from all impurity: evil is made ineffective in her through the purifications of her parents, by the action of the Holy Spirit who keeps her always under his shadow, and by her free choice. Thus she participates in the radiance of the Son’s Face: through divine grace, there are no shadows in her. Her light is the glory of fruitful virginity. Therefore, we need to deeply understand the meaning of Jesus’ virginal conception by Mary.Every creature, as such, comes into existence created by God. In this work of creation, a cooperation takes place between the love of the parents (the marital union) and the love of God the Father. This is not the case with Jesus’ conception: it is not a creature that comes into existence but the Word of God who assumes flesh in Mary’s womb. There is only the cooperation of two wills: Mary’s “yes” and God the Father’s “yes.” We do not pre-exist before our conception in our mother’s womb. Jesus pre-existed, as the Word of God, in the Father’s womb. Therefore, it is that precisely the Incarnation, the virginal conception of the Word of God, is Mary’s glory.Moreover, Mary perfectly fulfilled her motherhood not only in the conception and birth of Jesus but also in his educational work. We can catch a glimpse of her educational style when, with Joseph, she finds Jesus in the Temple, “sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking questions” (Lk 2:46). She speaks, but to say: “Son, why have you done this to us? Behold, your father and I were anxiously looking for you” (Lk 2:48). Mary puts the father in the first place. It is certainly easy to see in this detail a simple cultural custom. However, we can also consider that she does so intentionally, following her own educational style. Today we know that the boy’s psychological health requires a good relationship with his father. We have good reasons to think that Mary tries to favor this relationship between Jesus and Joseph. Thus, Mary fully realized her motherhood in generating, growing, and educating the Son, Jesus.She also presents herself now with a maternal face, of universal motherhood, through the intervention of the Holy Spirit, who makes supernatural what would have been natural in her: the face of a mother, of the new Eve. Divine motherhood awakens in her all the graces of femininity, receptivity, and intercession. Now we know that graces pass away, but “charity never will end” (1 Cor 13:8-10). Thus, through her charity, Mary continues to exercise her motherhood over all the faithful and over all descendants of Adam. Furthermore, Mary’s motherhood obscures the paternity of the Father who gives us the Son. The Mother expresses the heart of the Father, his mercy, tenderness, and love, which is the Son, Jesus Christ. This expression of tenderness is heightened when Mary’s face joins that of the Infant Jesus, as in the typologies of the Virgin Eleusa.**The Mother of Mercy**Mary’s altar is compassionate. In the antiphon “Salve Regina,” the liturgy uses these expressions: “Mater misericordiae, vita, dulcedo et spes nostra […]. Illos tuos misericordes oculos ad nos converte!” [Mother of mercy, life, sweetness, and hope of ours […] Turn thy merciful eyes upon us!].Our Lady of Guadalupe addresses Juan Diego, still a neophyte, with these words: “I am the ever-virgin Mary, the Mother of the true and only God. I desire ardently that on this spot a small, sacred house be built; that a temple be raised for me where I wish to make myself known, to manifest myself, to give myself to all with all my personal love, with my compassionate altar (in my compassionate gaze), with my constant help and salvation, for indeed I am your mother merciful: of all who dwell on this earth and of all those who love, invoke, seek, and place their trust in me,” (Nican Mopotua, pp. 26-31).This compassionate altar of Mary, the constant feature of all Marian icons, expresses God’s compassion for Adam and every descendant of Adam: God the Father “so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but have eternal life” (Jn 3:16). In Marian icons, the Virgin’s altars, which fix the gaze of those who contemplate them, and her hand, which shows the Savior, offer to anyone who is willing to be olted and guided, Mary’s faith, of the same temper as Abraham’s faith. Mary’s motherhood becomes an expression of the surprising and incomprehensible philanthropy of the Father, “who did not spare his Son” (Rom 8:32).**The Universal Maternity of Mary and Her Iconographic Face**I like to conclude this paragraph by emphasizing that Mary’s universal motherhood is reflected iconographically in her uncultured face, which assumes the features of every race, the color of every land, and the sound of every tongue. This dimension of faith finds expression in the art of every people, giving Mary’s face European, African, Japanese, or Latin American traits. Yet, what is most surprising is that the Virgin Mary, when she appears visibly according to God’s inscrutable designs for the salvation of all peoples, performs the same act of inculturation. A strong example is Our Lady of Guadalupe: her face takes on the features of a mestizo face even though mestizos did not yet exist, as her image was imprinted on Juan Diego’s tilma on December 12, 1531, ten years after the conquest of Mexico City. We can truly conclude that Mary gives a face to those who have no face and continues to do so, both to individuals and to peoples.**The Face of Mary in the World of Images**An image refers to the function of sight and is realized in spatiality. A word refers to the function of hearing and is realized in duration: the visual (televised) is spatial (planetary), while sound is temporal. An image presents reality. A word pronounces itself over reality, raising a problem of truth that transcends our sensory world. Therefore, in our current culture dominated by sight and television, it seems to impose a radical opposition between image and word, akin to the distinction between senses and intellect, or perception and truth.However, everyone knows that it is impossible to think without imagining and without speaking to oneself. Image and word contribute to thought and cognition, to every spiritual activity of our personal self, allowing us to express ourselves beyond sensory experience. Image and word share a common ground in the activity of the spirit, which unites space and time in cognition, perceived reality, and truth in thinking. This implies that an image can also introduce us to true cognition. And this is the case with sacred images because they represent reality not as it appears but as it is revealed and experienced, much like children do in their innocence.Therefore, in Christian anthropology, image and word are complementary, not contradictory. What the Fourth Council of Constantinople (869-870) stated remains ever relevant: “We prescribe that before the sacred icon of our Lord Jesus Christ, prostration be made in the same way as before the book of the holy Gospels. For just as all obtain salvation from the words contained therein, so too, both literate and illiterate, all receive their share of benefit from the iconic energy of colors available to us.” (Council of Constantinople IV, Canon 3).Therefore, the conjunction of word with image, realized in the Incarnation of the Verbo, forms the heart of Christianity and is even its central affirmation: “The Word became flesh and dwelt among us. And we have seen his glory, the glory as of a unique Son from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14). Thus, one must recount the complementarity between seeing and speaking, in the spirit of taking and Christian revelation. In this complementarity, the image receives clarity and determination from the word, and the word gains the ability to address both the mind and heart of the observer.We are thus led to reflect more carefully on the relationship between sight and hearing, between image and word, regarding the expressive activity of the observer. The image will thus regain its meaning within the context of spiritual expressiveness and show itself capable of evoking contemplation and reflection, opening the way to gratuity and beauty.Two concrete applications emerge from what we have highlighted about the significance of Jesus’ face in Mary’s face, two fields of action for Mary’s face: in personal faith life and in contemporary culture dominated by visual media.**Mary’s Face in Personal Faith Life**The icon of Mary’s face has a therapeutic effect on those who find themselves overwhelmed and are overwhelmed by her compassionate offerings. Mary’s altar reorders and heals each individual’s relationship with their own mother. We know that many psychological illnesses are both cause (in the observer) and effect (of the mother) of an incorrect relationship with the mother. Maternity, a valuable gift from God, has been marred by sin and therefore requires redemption and living under Jesus’ gaze. Mary’s face, entirely pure and perfect mother, acts on the troubled imagination, reorganizing it, and this reorganization has beneficial effects: directly on psychological discomforts, indirectly on physical illnesses, as it encourages the sick to discover the meaning of their illness. Along this path, Mary, mother of mercy, offers a salvation opportunity to every observer who seeks to bear their own burdens without being crushed by them.To use the icon of Mary’s face, some essential information about Christian sacred iconography is important. The icon is essentially an image and, as such, it is charged with emotion and stimulates action. And the Holy Spirit’s action follows this iconic path: grace travels through natural pathways according to universal salvific economy laws.In the Semitic view, the observer is composed of spirit, psyche, and body. The icon, while loaded with the energy of the Holy Spirit, acts on the psyche and spirit (our decision-making capacity), because “the Spirit of God comes to our aid in our weakness” (Romans 8:26), and this action also resonates in the body.

When offering the icon, before or after, there occurs a reversal of the offering: the one who offers realizes that he is being offered. If one decides to let him/herself be offered, they slowly open up to the other, not as a duplicate of themselves, but to the other in his/her otherness. With this conversion of the offering, the icon enters into the imagination and begins to restructure it more deeply.

Every icon is composed of negative space and color. The negative space primarily acts upon our logos, while the color, energetic vibration, acts upon eros. A harmonious balance between logos and eros, between rationality and emotiveness, is achieved through a carefully cultivated tone.

In the authentic Christian tradition, the icon, before being an event of beauty, is a revelation of God’s Word. Every icon contains a truth revealed that guides us towards the Whole Truth (cf. John 16:13). It is this truth, discovered and internalized, that “verifies” the tone.

However, the truth revealed by the icon requires careful and patient reading. Its energetic light occurs in silence, like a seed in fertile soil or water in arid land, and enters those who allow themselves to be offered, healing their mind (thoughts and convictions) and heart (imagination). Therefore, an essentially contemplative attitude, deep listening, is required, in which one remains open to receiving the icon’s gift, without imposing any conditions, receptive to the novelty of a mystery that could be revealed. From this perspective, we understand why the icon demands silence and prayer.

When contemplating icons, their intrinsic dynamism impresses: they convey in stillness what images typically express through movement. For us accustomed to this explicit and sometimes illusory dynamism, it is somewhat exhausting to fix our gaze on the receptive and unarmed offering of the icon: “offered in offerings”. Thus, we must distance ourselves from modern conceptions of images: the icon is not a window into the world depicted but a place of the presence of the represented mystery, which radiates to those who open themselves to receive it.

Now, if we engage in this type of visual prayer before an icon of Mary offering herself to whoever gazes upon her, with perseverance (a few minutes each day), our relationship of faith with Jesus will be revitalized and our spiritual life will be enriched. Mary, the Mother of God, will heal each person’s relationship with their own mother, their own body, and their own emotional sensitivity.

Dualism between soul and body encompasses a range of situations from culturism (prioritizing the body) to superspiritualism (prioritizing the soul), leading to negative attitudes, even heavy ones, towards fully embracing the humanity we are, because it forgets that “everything that God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if taken with gratitude” (1 Timothy 4:4). In such situations, slowly Mary’s face reveals the importance of the body to those who strive to live as angels, and the significance of spirituality and immortality of the soul to those who attempt to live like rational animals.

**Undervaluing Emotional Sensitivity, often coupled with the falsification of *eros* reduced to sex, encompasses a range of situations from excessive introspective fixation to psychedelic openness. The common defect is the lack of mature interiority capable of becoming a gift, as the sources of *eros* are polluted from which do not arise authentic relationships that allow the individual to live in true communion with their fellow humans. The icon of Mary’s influence on the emotional sphere is particularly effective and brings about a new harmony between emotionality and rationality. It enables us to enjoy realities and happy events with joy untainted by bitter remnants, and to suffer in adverse situations without losing inner peace. One might say that Mary introduces us to the poetry of life.****In the face of discomfort or illness, caused by the dramatic rupture of harmony between the components of individual life (corporeity, psyche, emotionality, values, lifestyles) and social life components (economy, environment, culture, society, and services), Mary’s face, which looks back at us and through which we let ourselves be looked at, reveals new modalities of self-management, even when the limits imposed by illness make us suffer. Finally, opening us to true relationships, it also brings about a shift in medical care, moving from organ-focused medicine to relationship-oriented medicine.****The Face of Mary in Visual Culture**I would like to begin this final reflection with a desire expressed by Pope John Paul II:*”Rediscovering the Christian icon will also help us become aware of the urgency to react against the dehumanizing and sometimes degrading effects of the multiple images that condition our lives in advertising and mass media. It is, indeed, an image that brings upon us the gaze of a hidden Other and gives access to the reality of the spiritual and eschatological world.” (John Paul II, *Duodecimum Saeculum* n. 11).**Today’s culture, dominated by visuals, is built on the immediacy of images that do not allow time for reflection, the association of events that does not permit argumentation, generalization that simplifies everything, and the seduction of images and concrete proposals. Following the Holy Father’s indication, Christian iconography can help contemporary thinkers overcome the idolatry of self-referential images, discover a life worth living, and appreciate the reality of the spiritual world and the eschatological faith in Christianity. In this work of detoxifying illusory seductions, demythologizing interpersonal relations, and evangelization, the icon of Mary’s face plays a decisive role as it reintroduces the image of woman and mother, not competing but proposing and reproposing a new mindset according to the imperative: “Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, so that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good, pleasing, and perfect” (Romans 12:2).In the current culture, which asserts itself as a global superstructure capable of homogenizing all regional cultures, scientific knowledge, technological development, economic relations, and an idolatrous worldview dominate. This means that a singular understanding of reality prevails over other forms of knowledge, with technology and economics dictating scientific research and politics. All this within an autoreferential framework where the gaze contemplates and satisfies itself alone. In this context, values such as family, politics, art, altruism in the logic of gratuitousness and gift-giving become difficult to live and sustain, as they face increasingly strong opposing forces.The visual world is essentially tele-visual, and the patina that makes everything shiny is idolatry, of which we must be aware. Therefore, a brief clarification regarding the meaning of an idol in contrast to the icon of Mary’s face is necessary.Something becomes an idol when, upon offering to it, it gives back everything the admirer expects. The offering finds everything admirable in what it sees and thus rests and reposes in it. Therefore, “the offering makes the idol, not the idol the offering; which means that the idol fills with its own visibility the intention of the offering.” (J.-L. Marion, Dio senza essere, 24).In contrast, an icon invites the offering to look at its visible to show it the unreliability of what it itself displays and to correct and stimulate it to offer even beyond what it can see in it. The icon thus becomes a manifestation of the invisible, relativizing its visibility, frustrating, to some extent, the expectation of the offering. With this, the icon does not fix the offering in itself but sends it back to the depth of what transcends all vision and knowledge. And this also applies to sacred images of Mary’s face. An icon displayed as a simple ornament and appreciated for its formal aesthetic value is reduced to an idol. Now, the operations of television culture are essentially autoreferential.The icon of Mary’s face offers a strongly corrective response to this “glowing” world while it is the face of a woman, mother, and pray-er.As a woman, she allows us to recover the warmth of intuition, which transcends dominant functional and instrumental rationality, and stimulates interpersonal relations. She herself is an unparalleled model in the gesture of running to serve her cousin Elizabeth. As a mother, she offers tenderness to every being born of a woman. With her psychological maternal reality, she can lead all other beings born of women who did not receive from their mothers the affection needed for their personal growth to freedom. And as she accompanied the Son of God in his public life, so does she know how to accompany each individual in their private lives and social relations.But the strongest contribution of Mary’s face lies in faith. A woman who knows to be amazed, like before the greeting of the angel at the Announcement. A woman who knows to truly listen to God’s Word, executing it step by step. A woman who knows to persevere in following Jesus, her Sentor and Master, even to Calvary. A woman who knows to wait for the fulfillment of promises until Easter Day.In conclusion, we can observe that the *imago Dei* by which man is created, is the constitutive principle of human nature, a gift of a being entirely turned towards its divine Source and which constantly allows it to return to It. Therefore, the image that ontologically guides man towards God is the face of Jesus, God made man. But the face of Mary, the Mother of all, gently and maternally introduces every “born of woman” into the decisive encounter with Lord Jesus. The face of Jesus in the face of Mary opens up a simple, easy, and pleasant path that allows us to rediscover our human dignity, our vocation to be children of God in Christ Jesus, and to be saints of the same holiness as God.“The paths to sanctity are multiple and appropriate to each one’s vocation” (Novo Millennio Ineunte, n. 31). However, Mary’s face, a true icon of Christ’s face, can call all paths to sanctity and contribute decisively in the elaboration of the “pedagogy of sanctity,” offering the sober sweetness of contemplative life that appreciates silence and prayer.To deepen contemplation of Christ’s face through Mary, Pope John Paul II’s Apostolic Letter Rosarium Virginis Mariae invites us to contemplate Jesus’ face with Mary’s gaze.**Deepen your studies:** explore Mariology, Marian Theology, Marian Apparitions, and a Master’s in Mariology.**Continue your Marian formation:** Explore our resources on Mariology, Marian Theology, and Marian Apparitions. Consider the Master’s in Mariology from the Locus Mariologicus Institute.For a deeper theological reflection on Mary’s face and its relationship with Christ, consult the Encyclical Redemptoris Mater by Pope John Paul II.

Discover the oldest Marian image in the Catacomb of Priscilla.