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ST. LUKE - PHYSICIAN

This Catholic fine art print is centered on the image of St Luke as he is writing his Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles. Luke the Evangelist (Greek: Loukas) is said by tradition to be the author of both the Gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles, the third and fifth books of the New Testament. Saint Luke was born of Greek origin in the city of Antioch. In Catholicism, he is patron saint of physicians. Surgeons, and artists and his feast day is October 18. His earliest notice is in Paul's Epistle to Philemon, verse 24.... He is also mentioned in Colossians 4:14 and 2 Timothy 4:11, two works commonly ascribed to Paul, and where Paul mentions him as a physician.

Luke became a disciple of St. Paul. Some manuscripts add that Luke died "in Thebes, the capital of Boeotia". All of these facts support the conclusion that Luke was associated with Paul. Later tradition elaborates on these few facts. Epiphanius states that Luke was one of the Seventy (Panarion 51.11), and John Chrysostom indicates at one point that the "brother" Paul mentioned in 2 Corinthians 8:18 is either Luke or Barnabas. J. Wenham asserts that Luke was "one of the Seventy, the Emmaus disciple, Lucius of Cyrene and Paul's kinsman."

There is evidence that Luke resided in Troas, the province that included the ruins of ancient Troy. Evidence of this is, he writes in Acts in the third person about Paul and his travels, until they get to Troas, where he switches to the first person plural.

In the central ancient icon, St. Luke is portrayed as a Greek man living in the first century in classical Greek clothes and setting. Above him is a dove surrounded by tongues of fire, which represents The Holy Spirit with his gifts and fruits and as the divine author of the scriptures that St. Luke wrote. Surrounding the Holy spirit in the top outer frame are seven fire like winged shapes that represents the seven spirits of God that surrounds his throne in the book of Revelation. Below and to the left the central icon is an oval that contains the bronze serpent that God told Moses to erect on a pole and that whosoever would look on the serpent would be healed. On the right is an oval containing the glorious cross of Christ upon which he healed us from sin. On the outer edge of the window are twenty fiery diamond like shapes which represents the twenty mysteries of the rosary which is a contemplative prayer of the life of Jesus and Mary and which is a source of healing, peace and reconciliation for all those who pray it with devotion.

Many popes have met with various organizations and guilds of physicians and have reminded them of the wonderful vocation and gifts God has given them in being his instruments of love, compassion and healing. John Paul II once told a group of physicians that in their vocation they had a blessed opportunity to practice the spiritual and corporal works of mercy especially in comforting and caring for the sick and sorrowful. He encouraged them to become ever more conscious of the spiritual dimensions of their work that would enable them to treat their patients with ever greater love and dignity as if they were ministering to Jesus himself and thus themselves grow in professional skill and personal holiness. In this culture of death where abortion and euthanasia is rampant, Pope John Paul II has called all Catholic physicians to be beacons of life and light as well as living witnesses to the Gospel of Life. St. Luke pray for us!