Clicked - St. Joseph

IMG_0817
Originally uploaded by carlyq80

APB and I have a recurring thread in our conversations. We are both working on our photography skills. When we see an opportunity for a picture we would like to take, but real life gets in the way, it's Unclicked.

This was almost Unclicked. I brought one of my children to a church to participate in a Stations of the Cross service. (It's a Lent thing, in catholic churches, if you are not familiar with it).

The church is going to be closing soon; it is one of many recently announced by the Diocese (who had a sinister way of going about it if you ask me; pull people from each parish, ask THEM to recommend which of their houses to close, and then say "well, YOU decided"....but I digress)

After dropping off my kid I walked out with the intent of getting this picture. But this church is NOT in a good neighborhood. And it was almost 6pm, getting dark, and there was a group of "kids" who were approaching, but definitely not on their way to this church, if you know what I mean, and I didn't want to put myself into a situation where I was all alone and waving a camera around. Not that mine is very expensive, but I am rather a chickenish old girl and didn't want to be hooted at for taking a picture of "a dumb statue". OK, that makes me 100% poultry.

So I walked down the street and got in my car and had an argument with myself about whether I had just been stupid and other labels. I decided to go back (ended up just driving down to park right near here), because I really liked the glow of the spotlight on the statue.

It makes me sad that things like this are no longer appreciated. They're no longer relevant to so many people. My church is beautiful, and I think about the people who used their time and talents to create the stained glass windows and the statues and the other elements.

How many people were inspired or comforted or proud to look at this statue? Who sacrificed money to give so that the church could have it in the courtyard? (These are the types of distractions that fill my head as I walk around every day. I see an old run down house in the neighborhood and I wonder who built it and how proud they must have been and think about how they'd feel to see it now. And then I get sad, because I am a rose-colored glasses romantic. )

And now beautiful things like this sculpture are being lost, slipping away. This courtyard will be locked, and for all I know the statue might be put into a storage garage somewhere.

Kind of ironic given that St. Joseph is held up as a role model for fathers, and this church is smack dab in the middle of an area that could really use some good strong fathers caring for their kids and leading them down the right path.

I could go off on a tangent about the "father" of this parish not being able to reach out to the community and relate to them and help them fight the decline that's spreading there... but.... I don't have much more of a dissertation formed in my head beyond that simple thought.

Anyway... clicked.