In the James Bond movies, good always triumphed over evil. The Conventual Franciscans have their own version of agent 007, the English-born Friar Matthew Bond who seeks to conquer the forces of darkness by spreading the truth, beauty and goodness of our faith by the “writing” of icons. An iconographer and novice at St. Francis of Assisi Novitiate in Mishawaka, Indiana, Friar Matthew has done many icons and has given workshops on the “writing” and spirituality of icons.
Two of his most recent icons are of two soon-to-be canonized American Saints: Mother Marianne Cope and Kateri Tekawitha. Both Blesseds lived in New York State and have close connections with the Conventual Franciscans (that’s another interesting story).
Friar Matthew’s icon of Mother Marianne depicts her bandaging the wounds of a leper. Her medical supplies are at her feet. A hibiscus, the state flower of Hawaii, is depicted in the foreground. The Franciscan Church of the Assumption is to the left of the saint, and the Motherhouse that she left to go to Hawaii in 1883, is to the right in the picture.
To see more of Friar Matthew’s icons, visit the Conventual Franciscan website.
How interesting! That’s a beautiful icon of Blessed Marianne Cope (she’s not a Saint yet-not until she is canonized this fall!).
Mother Marianne came to my hometown of Utica, NY, from her native Germany when she was a little girl. Her parish is still in existence, and it has a shrine to her in the front yard, and a reliquary shrine to her inside. We Uticans are very proud that she came from our city!
And the Mohawk Valley of Upstate NY is ‘doubly Blessed’ that we will have another new Saint in Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha! I live an hour’s drive away from her birthplace at Auriesville and her baptismal site in Fonda.
I sure wish I could go to the canonizations….only way I could do so would be if I hit it big in the state lottery, which won’t happen anytime soon! Oh, well, at least I can see something of it on EWTN!