broken winged angel

broken winged angel
Originally uploaded by Kevin Smith.

This statue was in the marketplace in Moldova, and I realize now that it's actually a good parallel to the country of Moldova. In my post titled "Reflections" I described Moldova as a beautiful country with great potential, though corruption and poverty have taken hold of it. Moldova is an angel with broken wings. Further parallels lie in the story behind this statue. Denis informed me that the face is the likeness of an author, and the angel with broken wings is from his most famous story. In this story, a woman falls in love with the North star, who happens to be an Angel. He can come down from the Heavens to be with his love during the day, but at night he must return to the sky. He asks God if he can come to Earth permanently, and God grants his wish. Upon arriving to Earth, he finds that his love is having an affair. He is so upset that he returns to his place in the Heavens and breaks his wings so that he may never return to the Earth again (this last part I made up, just to give it an ending and to explain the broken wings part, but I imagine the actual ending isn't much different). This story parallels not only with Moldova, but with all mankind. God is like the angel, and we are the woman. We forsook our true Heavenly love for Earthly lovers. Thankfully, our story can have a happy ending, as our angel desires to take us back. It is we who are broken; not him. And God wishes to restore us. If you notice in the picture, the gaps in the trees behind the statue vaguely take the shape of wings. This is just a glimpse of the restoring power of God. And if God can restore us for leaving him, certainly he can restore the country of Moldova.