Coloring Pages for All Angels’ Church

28 April , 2011

Recently I was commissioned to do weekly coloring pages for All Angels’ Episcopal Church in NYC for their Sunday services. I wanted to share them with you. Your kids can color them–or if you’re like me, you can color them.

Part of the challenge in this series was the design of the character of Jesus. We’ve all seen the sandy-haired, blue eyed rendition–but All Angels’ is a diverse church with a city population, including many international parishioners. I got off relatively easy in that I didn’t have to deal with color, but I wanted the Jesus character to be able to look realistic whether he was colored with “apricot”, “mahogany” or even “spring green” (ha ha). I recently returned from a friend’s house in Toronto who grew up in India, and they have a devotional room covered in the most beautiful artwork depicting Jesus (Yeshu) with Indian ethnicity. If I were doing personal pieces, I would most definitely (and have, in the past) depict Jesus in a specific ethnic context. However, he still needed to be recognizable to Westerners.

So here were my considerations: ethnic “neutrality” (though that term doesn’t quite get at it); keeping an icon of human history recognizable as an icon; giving him an “everyman” quality as someone you might see walking down the streets of our very own city, but not modernizing him too much–there are so many abysmal Jesus tchotchkes out there–Jesus in the Yankees hat; Jesus with his arm around the car mechanic, etc. You see what I mean.

So in terms of wardrobe, I put him in a simple Indian tunic, called a kurta, and pants. Whoa! Jesus in pants. And I shortened his hair. I believe it’s unlikely, anyway, that in Biblical times Jesus would have had long hair anyway. And I tried to make him look 33, which is easy since that would be my peer group. Jesus’ face is something I think about pretty often, especially his eyes–the kindness and compassion mixed with–gulp–omnipotence, and the ability to get wrathful, even. I try to imagine gazing into those eyes often. I know I haven’t even touched upon, you know, the Creator of the Universe here, but I tried. For the kids.

To download the image, click on the thumnail below, and when the image loads, control-click [Mac] or right-click [That Other Kind] and choose Save As (or whatever That Other Kind tells you to do).

Raising Lazarus	Triumphal Entry	Resurrection	Jesus Appears to the Disciples
The Road to Emmaus	The Good Shepherd	Fishers of Men	Jesus Promises the Holy Spirit
Jesus Prays for Us	God Pours Out the Holy Spirit	The Great Commission	A Cup of Cold Water
Dancing and Mourning	The Sower and the Seed

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