I grew up with the whitest Jesus you have ever seen. A Vitamin D deficient, sickly looking Jesus; a sort of Don Knotts meets Gary Busey kind of Jesus. And he was always pictured in the same way: standing in a field, holding a tiny lamb (also pasty white). Not surprisingly, our entire congregation was the same shade as that Vitamin D deficient Gary Busey Jesus. In short, we had created a Mini Me Jesus.
Of course, my church can't claim originality on Mini Me Jesus. Hollywood helped us out by casting numerous lily white Jesus', such as Jeffrey Hunter in King of Kings, or Max Von Sydow (a six foot four Swedish actor) in The Greatest Story Ever Told. And then there's my personal favorite: William Defoe as Jesus in The Last Temptation of Christ, even though Defoe is from Appleton, Wisconsin.
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