For LGBT 'Outreach' annual conference, priest creates icon of Pope Francis washing Jesus’ feet - CatholicVote org

CV NEWS FEED // At the request of Fr. James Martin, S.J. for the annual “Outreach” conference, Fr. William Hart McNichols has designed an icon depicting Pope Francis kissing and washing the feet of Jesus, with two same-sex couples behind them.

Fr. James Martin, founder of the controversial organization Outreach, wrote in an Aug. 12 article on Outreach’s website that Fr. McNichols’ icon “‘The Foot Washing’ depicts Pope Francis prayerfully kissing the feet of Jesus Christ, who appears after the Resurrection bearing his wounds, surrounded by two same-sex couples embracing. The Risen Christ is dressed simply, in a sweatshirt and jeans.”

Fr. McNichols was one of the keynote speakers at the Aug. 2 to 4 “Outreach 2024 LGBTQ Catholic Ministry Conference” in the Archdiocese of Washington, D.C. He is especially known for his artwork and his ministry to patients suffering from H.I.V./AIDS.

In the Aug. 12 Outreach article, Fr. McNichols wrote that the “painting is set in the cosmos, because the acceptance of LGBTQ people remains still in the present and into the future—something to come.”

He explained that the inspiration for the painting came during a penance service he attended at his local church, when a large screen showed guidance on Confession, followed by an “image of the cosmos.”

Fr. Martin wrote in his section of the Aug. 12 article that Pope Francis washes the feet of women, refugees, and others on Holy Thursday, and after the washing, kisses each person’s feet.

“These gestures have been widely seen as part of Pope Francis’s own outreach to those who feel on the margins of both society and the church,” Fr. Martin wrote.

Fr. McNichols also wrote about foot washing as a distinctive aspect of Pope Francis’ pontificate.

“If you asked me to create an image that symbolically defined Pope Francis’s papacy, I’d immediately answer with foot washing,” he wrote. “When James Martin, S.J., asked me to create an image for LGBTQ people and the Outreach conference, I thought first of Jesus washing their feet.”

“Then another idea emerged, of Jesus sitting with them, and Pope Francis washing the feet of Jesus and his outcast followers,” Fr. McNichols continued:

In his scholarly and prayerful commentary on the Gospel of Luke, the late theologian G.B. Caird calls it the Gospel of the outcast. He says something like: The only requirement to get into the kingdom of God is an emptiness only God can fill. That applies to us all.