In the presence of the Divine.

Triggered by the combination of a conversation in my "Method and Theories in the Study of Religion" class and this Queen of Wands strip.

When I very little, at the Cathey's Creek, there were two chairs at the front of the auditorium -- one on either side of the pulpit. As a small child (six or sevenish), I was convinced that one chair was for Jesus and one chair was for God. (Holy Spirit? What's that? Church of Christ, darlings, they won't touch the Holy Spirit with a ten foot pole. I didn't figure out what the Holy Spirit until I was eleven or twelve, at least, possibly older.) No one ever sat in them and the chairs actually had upholstery. It made sense that Jesus and God were present and they got to sit in the better chairs.

Then there was a gospel meeting, or a youth rally, or something, and some speaker sat in the chair.

Was my little self upset? Yes.

After this event, even though I knew that the chairs were for speakers and not deities, I still liked to think of them as being chairs for God and Jesus. Maybe this sheds some light on my attractive to iconography. If there isn't an official physical manifestation of the spiritual presence, I'll apparently intuitively make a symbol out of some object.

Don't know why I felt like sharing that, but there you go.