Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Iesu Christo, Pelecanus Mundi, as they used to say.

Jesus Christus Pelicanus.
Iesum Christum Pelicanus salvat mundi.
And all similar attempts to butcher Latin for my own ends.
It’s actually a very old (early Medieval, later Aquinian) thing in Catholic theology.
Called as such because it was believed the Pelican, to feed its young, pierced its breast and fed them on either blood or pieces of its own heart when no other food was available. Either that, or it killed its young and then resurrected them by stabbing itself in the breast and dripping its blood on their bodies, causing them to spring to life and continue right on growing up into good, moral, upstanding pelicans. This is…well, a direct allegorical link to the whole sacrifice of Christ on the Cross thing…also aided by how pelicans and cormorants dry their wings by spreading them out…in the shape of a cross…and generally looking all Jesus-like…for birds, that is.

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