I’m getting my chrismation icons blessed!

The second icon that’s being blessed is one that my friend is bringing back for me from Poland from World Youth Day. I’ve written about how the Black Madonna of Częstochowa loved me into Eastern Catholicism, not least because she is arguably the quintessential Eastern Catholic icon. But I remember actively seeking her out as an icon to pray with when I reached the height of my frustration with the rosary – and this was before I met the Eastern Jesuit who gently took me off of it. I knew of her existence as an icon and had become totally smitten with her, but it had not occurred to me to pray with her until I read St John Paul II on the rosary to figure out how to do it right once and for all: ‘Announcing each mystery, and perhaps even using a suitable icon to portray it, is as it were to open up a scenario on which to focus our attention’ (Rosarium Virginis Mariae, 29). But what would happen when I prayed with her was that instead of picturing the scenes in my mind, I would be drawn by her gaze at me, her gesture to her Son, and the Lord’s blessing upon me while holding the Gospels. I did not know what to do in those moments. I kept telling the Black Madonna she was beautiful, I put my hand on her hand, and I even tried whispering, Totus tuus ego sum, but none of it really did the job because none of that was enough to express the love that I felt as her eyes pierced my heart. I remember my first Eastern Catholic service when we were instructed to venerate the icon with a kiss, and finally then, I understood what I had been missing. The gaze of pure love must be met with a kiss.