I've got a picture of Jesus...and he has some really strange growth on the side of his face...it worries me.

Drawing the Divine: A Study in Spiritual Visualization...and stickers.

As a continuation of my earlier work in discovering the spiritual lives of my children, I decided to see what they envisioned when they were presented with certain ideas/spiritual figures, etc.  Would God look like Santa Claus on a cloud?  Would the Baby Jesus look like a baby carrot with a pacifier, like he does in the Dictator's Veggie Tales Christmas book?  Here are the results, after much deliberating and careful crayon work at the kitchen table:


God (the speedy prince charming):



The Anarchist's first drawing was of a race car because, "I don't want to draw those other things."  When she finished her race car, she got a fresh sheet of paper and declared, "Okay, now I'm going to draw a beautiful picture of God!"  Not surprisingly, this rendition of the Creator of the Universe does bear a striking resemblance to her earlier race car work, with the tasteful addition of a "shirt." Later, God was plastered with sparkly stickers to indicate his importance.

 The Dictator apparently envisions God as her ideal male, an amalgam of every Disney prince she's ever encountered.  Note the puffed sleeves of the tunic, the perfect bowl cut of the shiny black hair, and the elaborately laced shoes.  Our God is indeed a fancy God.





 Jesus (Jesus, Jesus rest your head, because apparently, that's all there is of you to rest):





This is the Anarchist's baby Jesus, or at least, the disembodied head of the baby Jesus.  It's a little disconcerting, like the infant Wizard of Oz or something...only way more adorable...and divine.


Note the strange growth on the side of Baby Jesus' face.  It's harder to see in this photo, but it's really quite prominent.  Is the Anarchist suggesting that Jesus was a leper?







The Dictator presents a charming manger scene, with baby Jesus hanging out way off to the side, apparently snoozing...or being shunned...maybe because he's purple.








The Holy Spirit (like you could come up with anything better):

The Anarachist drew this line, which I find is a surprisingly apt way to relate such an abstract and ethereal figure.  Either that, or she was trying to make the letter "N."  There's really no telling.

The Dictator imagines the Holy Spirit as a house.  I'd like to think there's some profound metaphorical reason for this, but I have a sneaking suspicion that it's because she has no idea what the Holy Spirit is, and she really just wanted to draw a house.






Angels (sorta):



The Anarchist gave up at this point, and proceeded to work on the letter "N."  It's coming along nicely.

The Dictator has angel/fairy confusion.  This is a "bird angel."  It sprinkles pixie dust on all the birds.  It was really just an excuse to plaster the paper with sparkly bird stickers.