Rite&Reason: Jesus mother Mary, whose Assumption Catholics celebrate tomorrow, was small and brown, not the white virgin we have been presented with, writes Jim Duffy
It is a classic cliche. The king, loved and feared in equal measure, witnessing his people on their knees before him, pleading their cases and hoping that his justice will be tempered by mercy. At his side sits his radiant mother, the queen mother, once crowned queen consort herself, there to intercede with her son on behalf of those fearing his wrath.
And around him a court of notables, there to be honoured as symbolising aspirations of the ordinary people, who themselves hope that one day they too could sit in the presence of the king, honouring and glorifying him.
Such images are central to what we have inherited in religion. Christ the King (the aristocratically sounding "Our Lord"), Mary, Queen of Heaven, the all-wise, all-knowing, always interceding queen mother, along with courtiers (angels) and nobles (saints), all classic symbols of medieval monarchy.
Pre-Vatican II, people spoke of "fearing The Lord" the same way as our medieval ancestors feared their monarch. Catholicism even constructed a royal family in the Holy Family, Jesus, Mary and Joseph, matching all in its curious pre-occupation with the number three in the faith.
We have Father, Son and Holy Ghost; Heaven, Hell and Purgatory; the Rosary's Joyful, Sorrowful and Glorious Mysteries, etc. The rest of the family mentioned in the Bible - Jesus's brothers, James, Joseph, Simon and Jude and his unnamed sisters (Mt 13:55; Mk 6:3) were conveniently dismissed as mere cousins or disciples, though most Catholic Bible experts privately accept now that they were really Jesus' siblings or half-siblings.
And Mary's virgin status matched medieval pre-occupation with the idea of virginity, as shown in everything from medieval folklore and writings to Protestant England's own "ever virgin", "Good Queen Bess".
"Devotions" (the word linked to ideas of devotion to the king) played heavily on those medieval royal images. The honours shown to Christ in the Eucharist (kneeling in the Presence, military salutes, etc) match the ritualised honours shown to medieval monarchs.
Prayers used language straight from medieval courts; people requested "favours" through praying to those who they believed could intercede, notably Our Lady (another aristocratic-sounding title), to have a word with her son. And saints were prayed to as well, like nobles who might know how to influence the king to grant favours.
Indeed, the brand images of Mary and Jesus, then and since, are striking. Neither is ever shown as they really were: small by our standards, brown-skinned. Instead, Jesus is imagined as looking like Robert Powell, the thin-faced white European who played him powerfully in a television series, rather than as he probably looked like, a young Yasser Arafat.
Mary too is westernised. And both are dressed in royal colours; robes of royal red for Jesus, royal blue for Mary or occasionally suitably virginal white.
It is a brand image straight from medieval central casting.
However, the problem for modern Christianity is that those very medieval images have less meaning to contemporary humanity; "Like a Virgin" is more likely to remind young people of Madonna than The Madonna. And if we demedievalise Christianity, do we have enough contemporary images to understand Jesus, Mary and Heaven?
And how do people pray to him in a way that does not reflect the medieval symbolism of pleading before the monarch to intervene to save a dying child, or help us pass an exam, as if somehow the child died because he decided not to help, or we didn't pray hard enough?
Should our prayers reflect a different form of communication, asking guidance or help from the Son of God in coping with the world around us, a world he lived in, rather than see him as a king in a heavenly Hampton Court giving an order that his courtiers (angels) will deliver, fixing things for us?
How do you convey the story of the Holy Family that avoids Christmas card cliche and touches on the hard realities: a young woman pregnant outside marriage (Mt 1:18) who no doubt faced behind-her-back gossip and backbiting. A Mary not dressed in Disneyfied royal blue and a crown, but the real human woman struggling to bring up her family after Joseph's death. Her carpenter son who mixed not with royalty, but with fishermen and working people, in a turbulent, unstable world that was every bit as violent, as corrupt, and as human, as our own.
Ultimately, can modern Christians really cope with less of Christ the King and more of Jesus the person, as God and man?
Or is the medieval cliche of Jesus the Lord on the throne, Mary the interceding queen mother whispering in his ear, like Blanche of Castille to Louis IX, too embedded in our image and our devotions, to be surrendered easily?
Jim Duffy is a commentator on religion and politics