Cem,
When I first saw this image I was literally taken aback at it's power and impact. Gary referred to it as stark and strong and I couldn't agree more. Part of it's strength is, of course, the subject itself but the environment and the lighting, to me, play an equal part. The coolness of the shadows, played off against the warmth of the woodwork and the glare of the light itself all contribute to the overall image.
To me, the story here is of Christ's last moments on the cross, the light receding, leaving him to the darkness. With that in mind, I don't see the need for any additional illumination on the icon, I think the shadow is much more appropriate. It's obvious where the light is coming from in the photo, there's no frontal lighting on the icon. Adding light here, in my eye, just doesn't look natural.
Since you said it was OK to fire away, I did this quick edit in Lightroom:
I dropped the exposure 2/3 stop, cropped to an 8x10 format losing some of the bottom, and darkened the pulpit another stop with the adjustment brush. The pulpit in the original was, for me, so bright as to be distracting.
The perspective distortion in the verticals doesn't bother me but it looks like it has affected the left arm of the icon, making it look unnaturally long. I'm not sure how you'd correct this, though.
Since you have another exposure 2 stops down, I'd be interested to see if you could paste in some detail in the window. It looks like it may have some kind of pattern, it might be worth taking a look.
That's just my $.02/worth, as you posted it I found it to be a very powerful and moving image. I hope you'll pursue it further.
Bill