Wounded Angel

More on the angelic theme today.

Tampere’s Tuomiokirkko is an excellent building, and contains a number of excellent paintings, full of deep symbolism.

There's the altar painting: The Resurrection of the Dead. Exactly a visual depiction of Bring me to life and Awake me.

There's the 12 boys carrying the wreath-chain of roses. Initially the 12 disciples, but it goes deeper than that, given the significance of 12 in the Scriptures. And what is it they are bearing?

And then there's the wounded angel (see left). Angels get hurt. But if they are carrying out the Master's business they are honourably wounded. The wounded angel is being carried by a couple of grim-looking boys. Spirituality is grounded in the hum-drum of everyday existence. Even a couple of factory chimneys in the background. This is no idealised fantasy world where the physical and the spiritual never meet. Here in the physical we are called to follow a spiritual existence – and it’s tough. Another River Deep song begins,

Here in the physical longing for a spiritual encounter with you, my God.

Can't separate the two. I am a physical and a spiritual being. Angels get hurt. And I will get hurt. Physically. Spiritually. But how many angels are there in this picture? Angels are messengers of God, and God will send his angels to take care of you. There are angels who take on human form, and there are humans who take on an angelic role. (And the Angel of Helsinki could have been one or the other. What is clear is that he was God's gift in that situation.)

In the painting the servants, the helpers, the carriers of the stretcher - the humans fulfilling an angelic ministry - are not robed clergy or important figures. They are the despised, the lowly – a couple of scruffy, dirty kids, and they don’t even look as though they enjoy their task. Unless you become like such as these you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

Michael