Mexican consecrated woman and artist Taís Gea Guinovart wrote an icon of Christ the King - Sacred Heart that Regnum Christi gave as a gift to Pope Leo XIV during an audience in Rome. The work seeks to express, through art, the love of Christ and communion with the universal Church. For the author, the icon is “a profession of faith and an act of prayer” offered to the Pope and the whole Church.
Born in Mexico City in 1986, doctor in Biblical Theology and master in Sacred Art, with training in the Holy Land and a career that integrates study, prayer and artistic creation, Taís has dedicated her vocation to announce the love of God also through beauty. Can an image transmit what sometimes words cannot say? In this conversation, he shares the spiritual origin of this icon, the meaning of its symbols and what it means to offer, from the charism of Regnum Christi, a visible sign of faith to the universal Church.
How was this icon of Christ the King - Sacred Heart born and why did you want it to be a gift for the Pope?
This icon was born from the desire of the consecrated and the consecrated laity Regnum Christi to give a gift to His Holiness, Pope Leo XIV, as they were to be received at private audience on the occasion of the two Ordinary General Assemblies. And the desire was to capture, by means of an icon, the spirituality of Regnum Christi.
And two of the main elements of the spirituality of Regnum Christi are Christ the King - Regnum Christi seeks to make present the Kingdom of Christ - and the Sacred Heart, which has always been linked to the spirituality of Regnum Christi as that Christ who wanted to come to show his love to men. And from this love that we receive from Christ, we too receive the love of Christ to make him known to all men and women and to bring them into a personal relationship with him.
How do the kingship of Christ and the experience of his Heart dialogue in the image?
Christ is presented as a King who reigns from the cross, manifesting a reign that is not imposed by force, but is given out of love. The colors that envelop the figure express this central truth of the Christian mystery: red, sign of his total self-giving and of his blood shed on the cross; and white, which evokes his purity, his innocence and the light of the Resurrection. In this harmony of colors is revealed the love that gives itself unreservedly and the holiness of the One who conquers sin and death.
In the iconographic tradition, nothing is decorative. What does each element of this Christ the King symbolize?
At the center of the icon, Christ offers his Heart to humanity. It is not a static gesture, but a living invitation: the open Heart manifests the merciful love of God who goes out to meet man, calls him, welcomes him and sends him forth. With one hand he blesses, communicating life, grace and peace; with the other he gives his own Heart, the source of every vocation, mission and hope. This gesture profoundly expresses the spirituality of Regnum Christi: a Christ who loves first, calls personally and sends us to collaborate with him in the extension of his Kingdom.
The royal crown is not a sign of earthly power, but a confession of faith in the crucified King, whose throne is the cross. It reveals the paradox of the Gospel: Christ reigns by serving and saves by giving himself. The cruciform nimbus, typical of Christological iconography, proclaims the mystery of his divinity and humanity, true God and true man, center of history and Lord of time.
The abbreviations of the name of Jesus Christ, according to iconographic tradition, confess that the One being contemplated is not an idea or an abstract symbol, but a living Person, present and active in his Church.
This icon is first and foremost a profession of faith and an act of prayer, offered to His Holiness Leo XIV and, with him, to the whole Church, as a sign of communion, of love for Christ the King and of trust in his Heart, from which every renewal and every mission flows.
What significance does it have for you that this icon was given to the Pope?
To be able to do this for Pope Leo was a real honor. It seemed to me a very beautiful gesture on the part of Regnum Christi that one of its members could express, through art, spirituality, because sometimes words fall short and art has many more elements that can communicate a spiritual message, as is our own spirituality, and that also leave it open to many others to interpret, to deepen, how to be enriched by contemplating a piece of art, a piece that, through beauty, can connect with these spiritual fibers.
It seemed very nice to me to be able to bring, in a plastic and visual way, an element so characteristic of our charism: Christ the King and the Sacred Heart, so that the Pope could perceive, through beauty and image, what we are.
Before this, you received a letter in which the Pope thanked you for the icon. How did you experience the moment when you received the news and what resonated within you when you read this?
It is a gesture of great delicacy on the part of the Pope to have responded to the letter I wrote to him. He thanked me for the icon. It seemed to me a gesture of a pastor who, like a father who receives a drawing from one of his children and is happy to have received it and fills it with affection, so I felt the Pope's letter, in which, with a gesture as simple as replying with a letter, he thanks me for my generosity. In fact, for me, it is an honor to be able to give him an icon.
It was very beautiful how he offered me his blessing and, especially, he has a phrase that, for me, was significant and encourages me to continue transmitting the faith through art.It is a motivation that the Pope gives me, where I realize that he himself also recognizes the value of art in the field of evangelization and that makes me see how it is a viable and rich way for today's society to encounter the beauty of God that is manifested through art.
What responsibility do you think an artist feels when creating something for the Church?
It is an experience of being aware that what one produces is not for oneself, but that, once it emerges from our hands, it is placed at the service, first of all, of the Church, but also of the whole of humanity. How many people go to the Vatican Museums and St. Peter's Basilica? Even if they are not Christians or even religious, they can admire this art and recognize its greatness and beauty.
Artists, in the end, are at the service of beauty, insofar as we lend our hands, our talent, our time, our effort; but that work we create no longer belongs to us, although it is part of us and has part of ourselves, because in the end it is placed at the service of all mankind.
It is a way of understanding that, in the end, what we do as artists is to collaborate with the Creator God, who creates everything beautiful and, therefore, we lend our hands so that beauty can be captured and people can perceive what is beautiful: God himself, beauty itself.
That is the responsibility of an artist and, above all, of a Catholic artist.We have an enormous responsibility to transmit the message, which sometimes is difficult to understand from reason, in a way that impacts all the sensibility: to the eyes, to the ears, when it is music, to the senses as well, and to the touch, when there are textures, when that piece can be touched. All the senses are brought into play and the artist helps the Christian so that his faith not only passes through reason, but also allows himself to be impacted by this beauty.
Cover photo: Nancy Nohrden, Director General of Consecrated Women, presenting the icon prepared by Taís Gea to Pope Leo XIV.
