Hello all, this is the beginning of a blog I will most likely forget to continue.

The Alefine (derived from my username Aleph) Collection is a collection of interesting public domain images that I have found in the plentiful galleries of Wikimedia Commons.

I intend on making a blog-post explaining why I collect such images, but for now I will begin with this image.

This is the picture known as Homo-Theology (Dutch for Gay Theology), it depicts what appears to be a flaming winged lion carrying a flag with a heavenly being shining upon it. There also appears to be a lady made of marble and a scribe spectating the strange scene.

Verily, this is quite a dramatic and odd picture and painting.

However I am able to identify some of the subjects/objects of this image:

The winged lion is the Lion of Saint Mark, who was the anonymous author of the Gospel of Mark. I like to think of it as his fursona :3.

The flag it is carrying appears at first to be an ordinary rainbow pride flag, however upon closer inspection you can see upon it a blue canton with white dots, clearly resembling the American variant of the rainbow pride flag.

The scribe depicted at the hind of the lion is none other than famed Catholic Philosopher: Thomas Aquinas. This particular portrait of him shown in the artwork appears to be a tracing of this older portrait.

The heavenly being in the upper-right corner appears to be Jesus Christ himself (T-posing à la Rio Jesus), shining down his divine blessing upon Gay Lion.

So what do I exactly, make of this complicated, yet intriguing piece of art?

Well, I first found this image while I was browsing through the Commons gallery, looking for images of St. Mark's Lion, since I love the damn lion. It is such a cool freakin' creature...

I first saw it in the Flag of the Republic of Venice (AKA the Banner of St. Mark), and tbh that flag is my personal favourite territorial flag of all time. We should have more pride flags with cool creatures on them methinks.

So, what is this beast doin' strutting around with the US ride flag into the Messiah's divine grace like it's pride month? Well, personally, I believe the lion in this case is a symbol of rebellion against the homophobic theology of old, as embodied in Thomas Aquinas.

This artwork shows that despite what hatred some people may obtain from the bible, the Lion shall march on with bravery, and in doing so, may even be the one who is truly deserving of God's love.

I'm not a Christian myself, or even particularly spiritual, but I know for a fact that religion does not mean hatred. Religion can be a tool for peace, love and compassion, or you can use it as a justification for oppression, intolerance and bigotry. Therefore, it is prudent to not deny the entire concept of religion and disavow those of us who are religious for merely being religious. We must recognise the people who learn and practice goodness from religion, for they will be the lions who brave the paths that the hateful shall not.