The triquetra, symbol of the Holy Trinity, surrounds the etimasia, symbol of Pentecost—with the Father as a throne, the Son as an open book, and the Holy Spirit as a dove. A “wheel of fire” with flames numbering twelve surrounds them to represent the twelve disciples. A border of olive branches denotes a new order of peace and unity, as the Holy Spirit reverses the divisions caused by the Tower of Babel.

BENEDICTION

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man's smudge and shares man's smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs —
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

"God’s Grandeur" by Gerard Manley Hopkins
(from Gerard Manley Hopkins: Poems and Prose, 1985, Penguin Classics)