Praying the Angelus with Art: This Week's Image

This lovely image is from the Cathedral of St Paul in Malta, built on the spot traditionally identified as the property of Publius, the Roman Governor who welcomed a shipwrecked St Paul and his companions. It probably helped that Paul cured Publius' seriously ill father (see Acts 28).

The depiction shows Mary reading not a book but a scroll, while in the heavens, Old Testament prophets unfurl scrolls lettered in Hebrew. Perhaps Mary is at that very instant, recalling the Scriptural words that spoke of her own role in giving the world its Savior.

Praying the Angelus with Art: This Week's Image

This week's Annunciation is a detail from an Italian prayerbook (Milan ca. 1430) in the collection of The Morgan Library and Museum.

Praying the Angelus with Art: This Week's Image

The Annunciation, by Helena Vurnik (Austria-Slovenia), Bishop's Oratory (1914)

Praying the Angelus with Art: This Week's Image

Here is a detail from a lovely page in a French Book of Hours from the mid-15th century (from the collection of The Morgan Library and Museum).