Is The Yellow Ribbon A Subconscious Form of Angel Worship?

By James Donahue

Since the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq began, there has been a strange new image appearing on the backs of pickup trucks, vans and automobiles. The image also is showing up on store windows, school posters and public signs.

We are referring to that art drawing of a twisted yellow ribbon symbolizing what is said to be personal support of U.S. soldiers fighting in foreign lands.

The showing of the yellow ribbon is an old practice that began during the Civil War. It was revived during the Vietnam War after Tony Orlando and Dawn came out with a popular song about tying a yellow ribbon around an oak tree. It is a ballad about a woman pining for her husband who had gone off to war. The idea was that she kept the ribbon posted on the tree, an analogy of a light in the window, until her man returned home.

When the song hit the airways yellow ribbons began popping up everywhere. Now with two wars raging and American soldiers stationed around the world, the ribbons were tied in bows and posted on front doors, trees and fence posts in front of homes. They also appeared on public light posts and store fronts.

The yellow ribbons were back again, still tied in bows, after 9-11 and our military was off in Afghanistan to fight. Those were the days when Americans could have been compared to a nest of hornets, all swarming and angry after being attacked by an unknown enemy.

We didn’t know for sure, then, that Osama bin Laden and his Al-Qaeda gang of international terrorists were the real culprit. It was an apparent assumption by our intelligence people that seems to have been correct.

The symbols of nationalism really started with the show of the American flag on cars and store windows. After the attack on Afghanistan, it included the yellow ribbons. Then the ribbons changed to bumper stickers with the bow removed and the ribbons displayed hanging down, with an oval hole at the top, and a flare at the bottom.

I was following a pickup truck through town one day and we were stopped for a while at a light. As I stared at that ribbon pattern I realized that I had seen that shape somewhere else . . . and it wasn’t a yellow ribbon.

Then it dawned on me. We can find the same image in a mosaic from a Thirteenth Century cathedral that depicts a seraphim, or archangel with bird plumage and wings, including a man’s face and hands jutting from its body. In spite of the added features, the main form of the entity’s body is the same . . . with the circular head, hollow tubular hole in its middle, and a flare at the lower part of the body.

Also from Godwin’s Cabalistic Encyclopedia, page 479, we find yet another image of a seraph, also from a Thirteenth Century structure. It shows the same figures, with wings.

If the ancient artists shared accurate visions, this apparently is what one very powerful angel looks like. It may be the image of all angels. They look nothing like the angelic images we hang on Christmas trees each year.

This leads me to a frightening thought. Have we subconsciously reached the point where we are worshipping the angels instead of the God that created them? And if this is true, how have we gotten so far off track?

We notice that there has been an unexplained support for war by people of the Christian faith, even though Jesus taught peace rather than revenge. Some who study the teachings of this great master have expressed confusion about the constant Christian support for warfare throughout recorded history. Every time we have gone to war the belief was that God was on our side.

The Germans, who also follow Christian teachings, thought the same thing during the first two world wars. It is said Hitler was a Roman Catholic.

The angels have always been a strong part of the Christian story. Their appearance can be found in both the Old and New Testaments.

It should be no surprise, then, that the angelic symbol is being openly displayed on vehicle bumpers and store windows.

Linking angels to warfare, especially the unjust wars launched by former President George W. Bush and his administration in Iraq and Afghanistan, is a sick mindset that apparently makes our actions appear justified and right in the eyes of God.

We believe, however, that if Jesus were alive today, he would be abhorred by the things we are doing in his name.