The Nativity of St John the Baptist

Today is the anticipated Feast of the Natuvity of St John the Baptist - as this year the Sacred Heart falls tomorrow on the usual day assigned to celebrating the birth of St John.

St John the Baptist preaching in the Desert

Guido Reno 1575-1642

Painted 1636-7

Dulwich Picture Gallery

Image: Wikimedia

Looking online for images of St John I was struck by the number similar of the Guifo Reni reproduced above which seem more concerned to depict a handsome male virtually nude than to convey anything of what he might be actually preaching about. Another fine example from over a century later is by Mengs:

St John the Baptist preaching in the Desert

Anton Raphael Mengs 1728 -1779

Painted probably in the 1760s

Museum of Fine Arts Houston

Image Wikimedia 

Saying that is not to be in any way censorious or puritanical, nor is it to criticise them as paintings but just to comment on the extent to which the image had politely and elegantly moved away from the doubtless more intimidating figure presented by the real St John in the first century Judean wilderness and on the banks of the Jordan. There is more of that in the painting by El Greco:

St John the Baptist

El Greco

1600

Fine Arts Museum San Francisco 

Image: WikiPaintings

If you do not want to travel to California then in Cardiff there is a lightly later version from the workshop of El Greco:

St John the Baptist

Workshop of El Greco

Painted about 1610

National Museum of Wales

Image: Wikidata 

In 2013 I posted The Nativity of St John the Baptist  for today’s feast. That has links to other posts I had written previously about St John.

Last year I posted about two later fifteenth century Aragonrse paintings that depict the story of the birth of the Great Forerunner in The Birth of St John the Baptist

Some years ago I wrote for the other of St John’s Fessts, that of his Decollation, a piece about six English medieval churches dedicated to him and for which in different ways I have affection or a connection. That illustrated article can be seen at Churches of St John the Baptist

I realise looking at it again that I should have included Merton College Chapel in Oxford as well. Researching images for this article led me to the website of a church that I clearly need to visit, the very impressive late nineteenth century Anglo-Catholic St John the Baptist Holland Road which does not appear to be as well known as it should be. The parish’s well-illustrated website is at About St John the Baptist Church, Shepherd's Bush, London. 

St John the Baptist Pray for us