My absolute favourite comic journal by Stevenson. Made me cry my eyes out. Even when I can’t articulate it, it gets to the core of what I think love is.
One thing I haven’t seen talked about a lot is one of the most symbolic twists of the new knives out movie being that Monsignor Wicks was the “harlot whore” everyone had been fearing all along.
This is according to Wick’s own standards for why his mother was a “harlot whore”: he A) had a child out of wedlock who grows up with at least one absent parent and B) had a love of power and material possessions that lead him to scheming to get his grandfather’s jewel back so he could be rich. He also removes all symbols of Christ from the church because he claims it’s more important to remember the “harlot whore” he had for a mother, and Father Jud even tells Blanc in frustration that none of Wicks’ homilies are about Christ at all, but about Wicks himself.
And the key telling point is that it was never the removal or death of Wicks’ mother that brought Christ back to the church: it was Wicks’ own removal. He was the “harlot whore” that was keeping everyone from Christ. Not just in the literal sense, but spiritual as well. Though the literal is beautiful too: Father Jud brought back the symbols of Christ and renamed the church “Our Lady of Perpetual Grace” (meaning mercy and love), and literally named it after her. There is only one member of the Wicks family whose name is on the church it’s not Prentice, or Monsignor Wicks, or Cy. Because the church was never about what any of them wanted. It’s about the grace that Christ offers.
DESKTOP PROFILE: "Untitled", nikolinelr on flickr + twitter + blogspot, nikoline on tumblr | MOBILE HEADER: "Bild vom 6.5.1955", Öl auf Leinwand, Karl Otto Götz
