In My Father's Eyes

Many of us have seen Salvador Dali's painting of the Crucifixion but until yesterday I had never known that the offical title of the painting is "The Christ of St John of the Cross."

The perspective from which Dali painted the scene is taken from St John of the Cross. Apparently, St John had a vision during which he saw the crucified Christ from above and behind, i.e. from the viewpoint of the Father in heaven. He made a simple sketch of the scene which lay in a monstrance unremarked upon for years until Dali and another artist saw it in the 1940's.

The monastery in 1968 removed the sketch and restored it, placing it in a new reliquary in the Monastery of the Incarnation in Avila.

How great is the love of the Father who looked down from heaven upon His dying Son and wept the tears of merciful love which fell upon us all.