The Holy Face of Jesus

A reflection on the address of Fr.Cantalamessa, On Jesus’ prayer
If I were an artist, how would I grasp Jesus’ countenance in a series of portraits? I would start with drawing Jesus in prayer, because it is only in prayer can we catch a glimpse of how he manifests himself to us. Why not through reading the scriptures?
We accept Jesus as our savior and brother, so we can say ‘Our Father’ to the Creator when we pray. Jesus unfolded the road to God the Father, making it possible for us to approach Him. There is a difference between Jesus and us: that is he is the only one who has the authority to call himself the ‘Son of God’. Through Jesus the mediator between us and God, we are attracted to participate in the relationship as if being part of the communion among the three persons of the Trinity. When Jesus prays to the Father, Jesus’ face reveals the glory of his being: the only son of the Father any moment, especially in prayer. This is the core quality I want to emphasize; if we ignore it, we can’t comprehend the Being of Jesus.
How does the face of Jesus look like when he prays? I think that many artists want to express this, but not all of them can do it successfully. To express the Holy Face in prayer is not an easy task since we did not have the experience to see Jesus with our own eyes. Nor did we have any chance to look at him carefully. As artists, if we want to depict a man as who he is in a painting, we need to know his character, or even his spirit. But how can we contact Jesus’ spirit? It is through the Holy Spirit and in faith, we can have deep cognizance of Jesus.
Jesus is not only a great man in human history. We can’t acquire a correct picture about Jesus from Zen master or from the New Age or even atheists. Their words about Jesus is elusive, unreal and inexplicable, because their knowledge about God is not promoted by the spirit of Jesus. The Holy Spirit is the imprint that church owns the authority to reveal the truth according to God’s will.
Jesus taught his disciples prayer so that they can know the Lord when they pray. For us believers, we can also know God more when we pray. We adore and worship God with our hearts and in truth, the spirit of Jesus conduct us to hike along the thoroughfare toward truth.