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Behold the Beauty of the Lord: Praying with Icons

Author:	Henri Nouwen
Published By:	Ave Maria Press/Alban Books (Edinburgh)
Pages:	128
Price:	£7.99
ISBN:	978 1 594 71136 7

Reviewed by Luke Penkett.

As an Orthodox, I am always interested to discover how non-Orthodox respond to icons. In this revised edition of Nouwen’s book, we are taken by the hand, as it were, by a master of the spiritual life and invited to join him in meditative prayer.

To a cradle Orthodox, Nouwen’s thoughts may seem ‘incorrect’. To a Byzantinist, they will seem ‘childish’. But to those of us who approach icons with an open heart, the four meditations enable us to come into God’s presence, for there can be no ‘correct’ way of thinking, through the heart,  about icons, and it is a child-like approach with which we best enter into a closer relationship with God.

Which four icons does Nouwen choose? The icons of the Holy Trinity, the Vladimir Mother of God, the Saviour of Zvenigorod and the Descent of the Holy Spirit.     

If you think icons are purely decorative, this little book shows that they are, rather, places of encounter with the divine. If you are too tired or depressed to pray (as Nouwen himself was, from time to time), they can refresh you.

In the 1987 edition, the icons were on a pull-out card. Here, they are on four separate pieces of perforated card. Thinking back over twenty years, I seem to recall that this is the only difference between the two editions.