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Persons, Robert

(Encyclopedia)Persons or Parsons, Robert both: pärˈsənz [key], 1546–1610, English Jesuit missionary. He left a fellowship at Balliol College, Oxford, and went to the Continent to be received (1575) into the Ro...

Sonderbund

(Encyclopedia)Sonderbund zônˈdərbo͝ont [key] [Ger.,=separate league], 1845–47, defensive league of seven Roman Catholic cantons of Switzerland; it was formed to protect Catholic interests and prevent the esta...

Last Supper

(Encyclopedia)Last Supper, in the New Testament, meal taken by Jesus and his disciples on the eve of the passion. Jesus broke bread and passed a cup of wine among the disciples, identifying himself with the bread a...

Passion cycle

(Encyclopedia)Passion cycle, in art, the depiction of the last events in the life of Jesus. The Passion was a favorite subject of medieval and Renaissance artists and was considered the most ambitious of projects. ...

Mary Magdalene

(Encyclopedia)Mary Magdalene i.e., tearful [key] [traditionally Greek,=of Magdala], Christian saint, a woman widely venerated in Christendom. The name Madeleine is a French form of Magdalene. She appears in the New...

Montserrat, mountain, Spain

(Encyclopedia)Montserrat or Monserrat both: mŏnˌsərătˈ, mŏntˌ–, Catalan mŏnsər-rätˈ, Span. mōnsārätˈ [key], mountain, 4,054 ft (1,236 m) high, NE Spain, rising abruptly from a plain in Catalonia, N...

John, Saint

(Encyclopedia)John, Saint, one of the Twelve Apostles, traditional author of the fourth Gospel, three letters, and the Book of Revelation (see John, Gospel according to Saint; John, letters; Revelation); it is high...

parable

(Encyclopedia)parable, the term translates the Hebrew word “mashal”—a term denoting a metaphor, or an enigmatic saying or an analogy. In the Greco-Roman rhetorical tradition, however, “parables” were illu...

Lord's Prayer

(Encyclopedia)Lord's Prayer or Our Father, the principal Christian prayer that Jesus in the New Testament (Mat. 6.9–13; Luke 11.2–4) taught his followers, beginning, “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your na...

baptism

(Encyclopedia)baptism [Gr., =dipping], in most Christian churches a sacrament. It is a rite of purification by water, a ceremony invoking the grace of God to regenerate the person, free him or her from sin, and mak...

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