I haven’t seen any Parrakeeps in the Cotswolds yet, but I expect they are here. They have reached most parts of England and have recently been seen in Scotland. Coming from the foothills of the Himalayas our temperate climate appears to be just right for the ‘Ringed necked Parakeet’ and there are now thought to be around 50,000 in the UK. Stories of how the Parakeet first escaped into our parks and gardens are fanciful, maybe Jimi Hendrix did release a couple or did they escape from the set of the ‘African Queen’ in Shepperton Studios? Nobody knows.

What is a real mystery is how this Cockatoo, (perching just above and to the left of the Madonna’s head) only found in Australasia, ended up in a 15th century painting by Andrea Mantegna called the ‘Madonna della Vittoria’ three hundred years before Europeans discovered the continent.

Heather Dalton, working on her doctorate in Melbourne, Australia first spotted the Cockatoo and recognized it as the iconic Australian Sulfur- Crested Cockatoo found on the Australian $10 bill, realised that it must have been traded around the coasts of Indonesia and India and have probably have ended up In Venice which had extensive trade links with the East. Having lived in captivity on its long journey the Cockatoo would have picked up and could mimic several languages, but sadly the records do not tell us which ones! However the bird would have been an exotic and valuable exhibit in the court of Francesco Gonzaga who commissioned the painting in 1493.

Cockatoos appear in European manuscripts dating back to the 13th century not just as signs of wealth and culture but as a religious symbol, as seen in Durer’s ‘Madonna with child’ 1533. The Cockatoos ability to mimic human speech was considered miraculous and by way of association came to illustrate the Virgin Mary’s miraculous conception and thus its appearance in Mantegna’s ‘Madonna della Vittoria’. The Cockatoo is there to tell us that Mary is different, maybe even divine!

The Carpenter?

Something similar is happening in Mark’s account of Jesus as he preaches in the Synagogue at Nazareth.

“What’s this wisdom that has been given him that he even does miracles. Isn’t this the carpenter? Isn’t this Mary’s son...”Mark 6: 2-3.

Up to this point all the old explanations of the world seemed adequate, but they had no words to explain Jesus. None of the ways they understood other people seemed to fit. He was more than a Carpenter, he was different from all his brothers and sisters, (Described as Mary’s son rather than Joseph’s), maybe then, some thought, he was John the Baptist, now raised from the dead. Even the disciples were at a loss, “Who is this man?” they asked after he had stilled the storm on Lake Galilee.

The world in which Jesus lived was just like ours, they could only explain it in ways that were familiar to them. Family, culture, history, experience had shaped and limited their ideas; there was no need to understand the world in any other way, until they met Jesus.

Donald English in his commentary on Mark puts it like this. ‘There are certain ‘canons of acceptability’ which influence people subconsciously, and make it harder or easier for them to accept ideas presented to them. Such untested impressions include, ‘If you can’t prove it you can’t know it’, ‘Only this life matters’, ‘You have to put yourself first if you want to survive’, and ‘Life is what it appears to be’. These and many other assumptions stand in the way of people accepting and believing the good news about Jesus’.

The Messiah?

There were however people amongst whom Jesus found a willing acceptance, those who needed him. The sick, the outcast, the troubled in mind and spirit, the widows and orphans who nobody had time for. All these people turned to Jesus because they had no other alternative. Maybe because they themselves found no place in a society that valued family and culture and respectability, they, like Jesus, were not ‘acceptable’.

We, like those who met Jesus, are challenged by his words, his miracles, his life, death and resurrection. They do not fit into any of the categories of explanations that we use to explain the world to ourselves and others. This is not a reason for rejecting his claims; rather it is a reason for rethinking our world and the way it works. The disciples were sent out into the surrounding villages with a message of ‘Repentance’, meaning ‘change the way you think!’ Just like that Cockatoo perched over Mary’s shoulder we are reminded that there are other worlds out there and other ways of seeing the world we live in!

Rev. Simon Brignall