Images of Jesus

In September 2022 as part of our cultural work we approached Mr Quinn to talk to him about how Jesus was represented around school. We have many icons around the schools site, with the vast majority portraying Jesus as a White European.

Mr Quinn gave us a year to undertake some research into the history of religious imagery and find images that represent the Oaklands Community.

We discovered how the historic  depiction of Christ was used to uphold notions of white supremacy.   On a number of occasions prominent scholars and the Archbishop of Canterbury have called to reconsider Jesus’ portrayal as a white man.

The historical evidence suggests Jesus likely had the brown eyes and skin of other first-century Jews from Galilee, a region in biblical Israel. But no one knows exactly what Jesus looked like. There are no known images of Jesus from his lifetime, and while the Old Testament Kings Saul and David are explicitly called tall and handsome in the Bible, there is little indication of Jesus’ appearance in the Old or New Testaments.

Finding  alternative images was not easy, eventually ten  images of Jesus were found including a very powerful one of  Doubting Thomas. Mr Quinn ordered these and they were framed and put up in the Oscar Romero Hall Foyer ready for the beginning of the new school year.

Year 12 6^th Form student.

Summer 2023