The statue of St. Jude at our shrine, like most representations of St. Jude, shows him holding to his chest an image (the Holy Mandylion) of Jesus.  This is an imprint of the face of Jesus.  According to the third century writings of Eusebius (the father of church history) during the reign of Agbar, king of Edessa (today in modern Turkey near Syria), news of the healings by Jesus spread northward.  The king was afflicted with a serious illness (some say leprosy), and he sent a messenger begging Jesus to come and cure him.  Our Lord afforded the king hope by sending word that He would sent someone later to aid the kind in his suffering.  It was St. Jude who brought a cloth bearing the face of Jesus to the king and healed him.  The king listened to the eloquent presentation of the Gospel by St. Jude, and the king and many of his subjects were converted.  After establishing the church in Edessa, St. Jude traveled through Armenia and parts of the Near East preaching the gospel and eventually being martyred for the faith. 

If this tradition is correct, the Mandylion of St. Jude along with the Shroud of Turin would hold the earliest known representations of Jesus.  Lucia Robinson Dugliss, a parishioner at St. Dominic's and iconographer, painted an icon of the image of Christ in the Holy Mandylion and presented it to the Shrine of St. Jude.  A framed reproduction of the original painting can be obtained through our St. Jude office.  See below.