12 Reflections on Paintings for Faith Formation (Painting #9 – “The Breath of Life and the Valley of Dead Bones”)

Fr. Roy M. Thottam, SJ, Jesuit in Kerala Province, in India, shares 12 of his beautiful paintings and reflections, with teachers in our global community, as a set of resources for Faith Formation. We will be posting them as a series of articles every Friday! Here is painting and reflection number 9.

To read an introduction shared by Fr. Roy on his work, and also see the paintings and reflections that have been shared so far, please follow this link 12 Reflections on Paintings for Faith Formation

We hope you enjoy using these extraordinary and unique resources in your Faith Formation programs with other educators and / or with your students in your classrooms.

12 Reflections on Paintings for Faith Formation – Painting #9 “Breath of Life and the Valley of Dead Bones”, and Reflection #9 “The Breath of Life and the Valley of Dead Bones”.

The Breath of Life and the Valley of Dead Bones

The vision of prophet Ezekiel, so relevant today,

In this dreadful socio political situation,

The world sometimes like a valley of dead bones,

The culture of death prevails,

Violence of all kinds take away all freedoms,

the humanity is divided by politics and religions.

Rulers with their rude hegemony make people dead in mind,

Taking away their freedom and fill them with fear.

At times we  fall into the dead valley inside of us also,

Longing to restore our real graced self.

We stand in need of resurrection,

The spirit of God empower us with inner strength.

He will put an end to our disenfranchised and hopeless exile.

May we be clothed with love and compassion,

to be risen up to the fullness of life.

May the breath of God renew the face of the earth.