I didn't grow up with icons, being a small-town Oklahoma Methodist preacher's kid. I must have run across my first icon when I was living in Nashville as a young adult. In those days I was involved in justice work through Edgehill United Methodist Church and Nashville's Peace with Justice Center. We were protesting against nuclear weapons and the oppression of the poor in El Salvador. The first icons I remember seeing were contemporary images by Robert Lentz, a Franciscan bro

Icons are painted to lead us into the inner room of prayer and bring us close to the heart of God. - Henri Nouwen, Behold, the Beauty of...