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If I asked you to picture the Virgin Mary, what image would be conjured up in your mind?
I know who I'd see.
I'd see a mother looking dotingly, lovingly, endlessly, caringly at her baby.
I'd see a halo.
I'd see perfection.
I'd see a white woman with rosy pink cheeks and blue eyes and blonde hair.
And I'd see someone who doesn't look anything like me.
I'm Ginny McDonald and I'm a black woman living in the UK.
I'm a writer and broadcaster and my day job is director of a think tank that explores religion and society.
I wrote a book recently called God Is Not a White Man.
I'm currently working on a book that explores the divine images and how they relate to motherhood and how that compares to us as mere mortals.
So I think a lot about divine images and how they compare to us as human beings.
And recently I discovered that there are such a thing as Black Madonna icons.
So I've come to France to find.
Out more about them.
Apparently there are more here than anywhere.
Else in the world.
I have felt extraordinarily excited about this because there's a sense of the unknown and there's a sense of adventure, the sense of going on a pilgrimage in search of something that is not easily accessible and also nervous about how exactly I'm going to feel when I am standing in front of Black Madonna.
I've never seen one before.