San Damiano Cross

And she'll point to who the people are, and a lot of times it's just Jesus again, but in a different form.

Like, there's Jesus on a cross called the San Damiano Cross from Assisi, Italy.

There's Jesus as the Good Shepherd from Jerusalem.

There's Jesus as Divine Mercy from Poland.

he took that very literally so literally

you know like his um His experience before the San Damiano Cross, where Jesus tells him to rebuild the church, he's like, okay, let me go get some bricks.

This church is falling apart.

And I related to that, that desire to do something big for Jesus.

Yeah.

So I taught in our Austria campus and Gomming Austria is tied to Franciscan, but I taught the San Damiano cross course.

And so we painted the icon of the San Damiano crucifix and it is the cross that spoke to St. Francis and was kind of a launching point of his conversion.

And the cross, Christ from the cross said, Francisco, rebuild my church.

How has teaching, especially let's say the experience that you've just had in Austria, how has that shaped your own creativity more recently?

That's a good question.

I feel like it's always, especially pondering the San Damiano Cross is such a like a well of inspiration and consolation to my heart that the Lord chooses to speak through art.

This is a very tangible example that he could have spoke to St. Francis in literally any other way, but he chose an image of himself.