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Notes on the Architecture and Appointments of the New Church of
Our Lady of Walsingham
in the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston

 

  

 

 

 

by Dr. Clinton Brand
Verger & Acolyte Master, Our Lady of Walsingham Catholic Church
Associate Professor of English, University of St. Thomas

 

 

AWESOME IS THIS PLACE
IT IS THE HOUSE OF GOD
AND THE GATE OF HEAVEN

~ from the cornerstone of the new church

            Raised to the glory of God and consecrated in honor of His Holy Mother, the parish church of Our Lady of Walsingham proclaims in its architecture and appointments the visible language of the Catholic faith. 

Figuring spiritual truth in material form and speaking from stone, wood, fabric, metal, and glass, every element of the new church summons the faithful to “worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness” (Psalm 96.9).  The design and craftsmanship of the building also answer to the call of the Second Vatican Council for the dedication of sacred art and architecture to “worthily and beautifully serve the dignity of worship” (Sacrosanctum Concilium, no. 122).  This parish church is fashioned to do the work of God and shaped to be the instrument of grace.  Its bells bid the parish community to prayer.  Its timbered ceiling and high arches induce quiet reverence.  Its images and statuary recall the mighty feats and figures of our faith and challenge us to a like sanctity.  Its nave, chancel, and sanctuary direct the gaze and focus attention on the mystery of our redemption.  Everything points towards and converges at the Altar as the Mensa Domini and the stage for enacting the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.  And there prominently situated before the reredos and framed by Calvary rests the Tabernacle, the very house and habitation of the Most High--the sheltered, sheltering Presence of our Lord Christ. 

As the Catechism of the Catholic Church describes the architectural and artistic ordering of a church, “In this ‘house of God’ the truth and harmony of signs that make it up should show Christ to be present and active in this place” (no. 1181).  In its plan, furnishings, and artwork, our new church seeks to enable the liturgical actions it is designed to envelop and to realize the sacramental grace it is intended to manifest.  Ordered to truth and harmony and directed to the ends of contemplation, adoration, and sanctification, the works of beauty composing the church signify in space and time our participation in the Body of Christ and lead beyond themselves to the eternal, thereby representing and effecting our hope of beatitude hereafter. 

As the Domus Dei (housing the active presence of Christ) and the Porta Caeli (prefiguring the Heavenly Jerusalem), Our Lady of Walsingham Catholic Church demonstrates through its structure and adornment the enduring vitality of some of the noblest architectural traditions of the Universal Church.  Yet it also bears special witness to the particular traditions that constitute this parish as a congregation formed under the auspices of the Pastoral Provision of Pope John Paul II for the Anglican Use of the Roman Rite.  In all the historical associations of its form, style, and appointments, the new church testifies both to the survival and to the revival of Catholic faith and practice in the Anglican tradition, and it visually celebrates the restoration of this worthy patrimony to its proper home in the fullness of the Church.  Recalling the country churches of medieval England, the church also evokes the ethos of Anglican parish life and a sensibility Catholic in origin and resonant throughout the English-speaking world.   The building is specifically designed for the celebration of the Sacred Liturgy, the recitation of the Divine Office, and the administration of the sacraments according to the Anglican Usage as ratified by the Holy See in The Book of Divine Worship.  It is built as well for the musical expression of liturgical prayer in hymnody and psalmody and in the great tradition of English choral singing.  Built for song and prayer, this church itself is a visible song and a palpable prayer, the image of the “living stones” of the Lord’s Temple, singing a prayer old and ever new, universal and timeless, yet established in and for this time and this place. 

Entrusted to the patronage of the Blessed Virgin under her venerable title as the Lady of Walsingham, this parish community supplicates her maternal care while commemorating her appearance in 1061 to the widow Richeldis de Faverches in the Norfolk village of Walsingham.  It also honors one of the most famous Marian shrines in all Europe for nearly five hundred years.  The faithful flocked to Walsingham from the time of the first pilgrimages to the Holy House built at Our Lady’s request in the eleventh century until the shrine’s wanton destruction at the hands of Henry VIII in the sixteenth century.  In renewed devotion, the Lady Chapel of the new church is built to replicate the form and dimensions of the original Holy House at Walsingham.  It calls to mind the humble dwelling of the Holy Family at Nazareth, together with the mystery of the Annunciation, and represents this parish’s special dedication to the hallowing of family life. 

The association with Walsingham also links the parish to the restored Catholic shrine in England and to the faithful witness of yet another remarkable woman.  In the nineteenth century, Charlotte Pearson Boyd, first as an Anglican and then as a Catholic convert, exercised her own devotion to the Virgin of Walsingham by rescuing from neglect and desecration the little Chapel of St. Catherine of Alexandria, the so-called “Slipper Chapel” (in medieval times the “station” church at which pilgrims would leave their shoes before walking the final mile in penance to the Holy House).  The re-consecrated Slipper Chapel became in 1934 the official Roman Catholic National Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham in England.  Our parish in Houston is privileged to have and to venerate one of the statues of the Blessed Mother of Walsingham that was for a time revered by modern-day pilgrims in the English national shrine.  For those who enter this church, our own pilgrim’s way is the way of Mary and Richeldis and Charlotte Boyd and of the saints and martyrs honored in these precincts.   

According to one of the most ancient traditions of Christian architecture, this path is symbolized in the long stretch of the nave leading to the sanctuary and the Altar, here in this place set in a magnificent reredos made in the medieval manner and modeled after the altarpiece in the Slipper Chapel.  Following the example of our Patroness and assisted by her prayers, we are taught in this place and by this place to magnify the Lord and to rejoice in God our Savior.

            The new church of Our Lady of Walsingham was designed by the Boston firm of HDB / Cram & Ferguson, the partnership founded by the great American architect Ralph Adams Cram, who was a major figure in the modern renaissance of Gothic form in sacred architecture.  Working in the spirit of Cram and in close consultation with Father Moore and Deacon Barnett, the principal architect for the commission, Ethan Anthony, sought to design a church that would serve as “an exposition of the language and liturgy of Catholic faith” and “a church that celebrated the connection of the parish with Walsingham, the shrine, and the lovely flint churches of Norfolk.”  In his notes for the project, Mr. Anthony names as a particular inspiration the fourteenth-century Church of St. Peter in Great Walsingham, another “station” for pilgrims on their way to the Holy House.  With its square West tower, its circular clerestory windows, and large, low nave windows, St. Peter’s typifies the medieval churches of Norfolk and presents a striking fusion of elements from several periods of English Gothic church building.  Further enriching the design with features characteristic of other medieval churches, Mr. Anthony included a cruciform plan with transepts to house the baptistery, Martyrs’ Chapel, and Holy House, adding also a polygonal apse issuing from a spacious chancel.  The exterior stonework of roughly hewn Texas split limestone captures the texture of the old flint churches of Norfolk.  Among the exterior accents, rising from the gables of the transepts and apse one sees three stone crosses in a pattern designed by Ralph Adams Cram.  Leaping from the corners of the tower, in the place of gargoyles, there are the symbols of the four Evangelists carved by local sculptors (the winged-man of Matthew, the lion of Mark, the ox of Luke, and the eagle of John).  With its pointed arches, timbered ceiling, and slate pavement, the interior exemplifies medieval English principles of construction in the contrast between the white plaster and the dark oak paneling and screenwork seen throughout the building.  As the architect notes, “In every part of the building natural materials are used in a natural way to express the spirits of truth and harmony and divine inspiration that have guided us in the entire design and construction process.  It is truly a work to the Glory of God.”    

            You enter the church summoned by three bells cast at the foundry of Cornille-Havard in France and christened with the names Margaret, Agnes, and Jude.  At the large oak doors you will notice on the front of the bell-tower two large Canterbury crosses calling to mind Pope St. Gregory the Great and St. Augustine of Canterbury, the twin patron-saints of the Anglican Use in the United States.  Stairs ascend from the narthex leading up to the choir loft and the belfry.  In small lancet windows above the stairwells, you can see stained glass depicting, on the right, St. Clare of Assisi and, on the left, a memorial to the Wenner family with a raven in flight and the armorial insignia of the Carmelites.  High over the doors leading into the church hangs a large, antique crucifix prompting silence and beckoning the faithful into the body of the church.

Passing into the nave, just behind you, there rises above the paneled choir loft the carved screen of the organ case, figured with arches and quatrefoils and housing the twenty-six ranks of pipes making up a tracker organ.  The instrument was first constructed by the Bosch Organ Company of Germany and then redesigned by the Redman Organ Company of Fort Worth specifically to serve the stylistic demands and musical range of Anglican service music.  On the paneling of the choir loft there hangs a gilt and polychrome carving of the papal tiara and crossed keys adorned with corded tassels.  This splendid antique comes from Venice and dates back to the seventeenth century.  In the nave, you will notice the high wooden ceiling with its arch-braced beams, the round clerestory windows, the aisle piers and arcades, and spanning the breadth a series of large, gently pointed arches at the crossing, the chancel, and the sanctuary.  Flanking the choir loft above the door to the bride’s room (on the Epistle side) and over the door to the Confessional (on the Gospel side), you can look up and behold Byzantine icons of St. Joseph and the Divine Mercy.  Along the aisles and distributed between the nave windows, you will see the Stations of the Cross also rendered in the Byzantine style and combining in their sequence of images the narrative power of this Western devotion and the luminous clarity and color of Eastern iconography. 

Under the coffered ceiling of the crossing, just in front of the chancel rail on the Epistle side, you will note the carved eagle lectern for proclaiming the Word, a fixture common in English churches and so fashioned with outspread wings because of the association with St. John the Evangelist and on account of the medieval belief that the eagle flies highest of all birds.  On the Gospel side stands the large, elevated, octagonal pulpit with reticulated tracery of the arch motif that runs throughout the church.  Again modeled in a style characteristic of English churches, the pulpit was fashioned of tropical hardwoods (Port Assisi Cedar and Granadillo) by craftsmen in Bogotá, Colombia.  The front of the pulpit is adorned with a small statue of Our Lady of Walsingham, the first such acquired by the parish after its establishment in 1984 and the figure that has marked the pilgrim’s path for this community ever since.

High in the Gospel-side transept you can see the large rose window dedicated to the mystery of Pentecost and the indwelling of the Holy Ghost in the Church.  From the central figure of the descending Dove color radiates outward to the symbols of the Twelve Apostles comprising the apostolic college and the great wheel of the Church.  Below is the baptismal font, which is octagonal in shape, adorned with Gothic tracery, and crafted of stone here in Texas.  In the lancet window above the font, stained glass depicts the baptism of Jesus in the River Jordan.  In this transept stands also the Martyrs’ Chapel which reposes in its altar relics of the sixteenth-century English martyr St. John Fisher and the twentieth-century Mexican martyr Blessed Miguel Pro, to both of whom this parish offers fervent devotion.  Next to the baptistery, in the corner of the chapel, there is an impressive sculpture of the Pieta modeled after Michelangelo’s great statue in St. Peter’s Basilica.  In the arch over the altar of the Martyrs’ Chapel, you can see and venerate a three-hundred-year-old Russian icon of Christ the Teacher, a treasure of sacred art rescued from Soviet tyranny and generously donated to this parish. 

The transept on the Epistle side forms the enclosure of the Holy House and serves as the Lady Chapel.  The wall around its entrance from the nave is paneled with a great wooden screen crafted in Colombia by the same artisans who made the pulpit and the chancel rail.  Pilasters, scrollwork, and arches surmounted by a row of quatrefoils frame the door marked by the ancient seal of the Walsingham shrine, carved after the manner of the seal of the Augustinian priory that held the medieval Holy House.  High above the screen and roof of the Holy House, there is the splendid Lady window showing the traditional iconography of Our Lady of Walsingham, holding her lily scepter, enthroned and crowned with Jesus, attended by the angels, and regnant as Queen of Heaven.   

Inside the Holy House, you enter an intimate space of prayer and meditation, built to the exact specifications and dimensions of the original medieval shrine at Walsingham.  This dwelling with its white plaster, its close-set rough-hewn oak timbers, and hammer-beam ceiling is designed to resemble a tenth-century Saxon house.   On the inside of the door, there is in a gilt frame a delicately painted and glazed rondel from Assisi depicting the Annunciation.  The lancet window pictures in stained glass the Holy Family returning from Egypt to Nazareth.  In the Holy House you will notice in the corners on either side of the altar Italian statues of St. Joseph and the Archangel Gabriel on elevated niches above stands of votive candles.  The altar holds a relic of St. Dignus (the early Christian martyr) and bears on its front a fine Byzantine icon of the Last Supper.  On the gradine over the altar and flanked by candlesticks rests a golden Tabernacle, crafted by Talleres de Arte Granda in Spain, depicting in sculpted relief on its door Jesus and Mary in Joseph’s woodshop.  Kneeling there, you can look up at the wall over the altar and gaze upon the statue of the Lady of Walsingham, enthroned with her Son, seated in their gilded, painted niche, and there you can add your voice in prayer to her humble, receptive fiat in the Annunciation. 

Thus composed, you are ready to enter again the nave and to look up at the great rood beam spanning the chancel arch and to behold thereon the Holy Rood with the corpus of Christ stretched on the cross in the form of the Great High Priest wearing eucharistic vestments (complete with a maniple).   On either side of the Rood, statues of His Holy Mother and St. John the Evangelist turn their eyes in adoration on the figure of the Salvator mundi in the center.  This crucifix and these statues were carved, painted, and gilded in Italy with exquisite artistry.  All together with the beam that supports them, they comprise an architectural feature of many English churches, often including in medieval times elaborately carved rood screens and lofts with candles.  The rood beam above and the communion rail below serve to delineate sacred space, distinguishing the nave from the chancel, set apart with its light-colored marble and encaustic pavement,  and framing the sanctuary with its high Altar raised on steps in the apse.  They thus mark the ancient tripartite structure of Christian churches and reflect the three parts of the Jewish Temple with the nave corresponding to the Inner Court, the chancel representing the Holy Place, and the sanctuary imaging the Holy of Holies. 

            In the chancel this trinitarian motif recurs with the three arches on either side, rising above the wainscoting on the walls and encompassing the stalls facing each other to accommodate a choir in singing the daily offices or the celebrant and his servers at Mass.  On elevated niches on the sides just below the sanctuary arch, you will see statues of St. Thomas More and St. John Fisher, standing almost as guardians of the sanctuary wherein we find the central Altar, the Tabernacle, and the reredos.  In the Altar reposes a relic of St. Elizabeth Anne Seton, the first American-born saint canonized by the Church. On the front of the Altar (and usually concealed from view behind the fabric frontal) there are Byzantine icons of Christ the Bridegroom surrounded by Our Lady of Sorrows and St. John the Baptist. 

Resting on the retable of the reredos glimmers the golden Tabernacle built by artisans of Talleres de Arte Granda, the Spanish studio of liturgical arts.  Designed to represent the form and proportions of the Ark of the Covenant, as described in the Book of Exodus, sheltering the all Holy Presence of God, the Tabernacle displays on its doors the first and last letters of the Hebrew alphabet, Aleph and Tau, as one of the Hebrew names for the Most High and the precedent for Christ’s words, “I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last” (Rev. 1:11).   The Hebrew word for truth begins with Aleph and ends with Tau and thus attained a mystical significance.  The inscription on the Tabernacle is thus a reference to the patristic wisdom that saw in the Ark a prefigurement of Christ Who is Truth itself.   Painted in red letters on the edge of the retable just below the Tabernacle are the words “ECCE AGNUS DEI ”—Behold the Lamb of God.   Thus are the faithful bidden to remember the Victim offered up in the Sacrifice of the Mass. 

Framing the Tabernacle with the scene of Calvary and rising above the Altar stands the splendid Gothic reredos inspired by the altarpiece in the Slipper Chapel.  Carved from cedar, painted, and gilded using medieval techniques, the reredos (like the Tabernacle) comes to us from the craftsmen of Granda in Spain.  The gold leaf was applied with traditional processes, involving numerous steps of priming, application, and burnishing.  Against a background of blue set amid gold and running vinework on red, we see the crucified Christ together with Mary and John, all set between striking images of the martyrs St. Catherine of Alexandria (on the Gospel side) and St. Lawrence (on the Epistle side).  The garments of the saints are finished with the technique of estofado which entails gilding the statues, painting over the gold, and then etching intricate patterns in the paint to reveal the brilliant metal underneath.

            To complete the sanctuary as the center of attention and the focus of prayer, three large apsidal windows with simple geometrical tracery fill the scene with light.  The stained glass for these windows was crafted at the studios of Willet Hauser Architectural Glass in Philadelphia in a style reminiscent of the nineteenth-century Gothic revival.  The central altar window depicts the Nativity together with the adoration of the shepherds and the magi.  In large Gothic script in a painted arch over this central window, you read the words, “The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us.”  The Gospel-side window pictures the Blessed Virgin and St. Gabriel in the Annunciation, and on the Epistle side we see the image of Our Lady’s apparition in Walsingham to Richeldis, in the company of her son Geoffrey bearing a pennon of St. George, the patron saint of England. 

The program of stained glass windows has been substantially completed, flooding the church’s interior spaces with the colors and figures of sacred history.  The first nave window on the Gospel side shows Jesus blessing the little children, in the center we see the Resurrection, and the last depicts Christ’s bestowal of the Keys upon St. Peter.  On the Epistle side, the Visitation is pictured in the first nave window.  In the center we see the Holy Family in Joseph’s workshop.  The Wedding at Cana is shown in the last nave window, toward the back of the church.  Among the eight round clerestory windows, you can see striking images of St. Michael (on the Gospel side) and St. Raphael (on the Epistle side), together with the other archangels.  The window that shines in the confessional appropriately depicts Christ the Good Shepherd, while in the bride’s room we see the Presentation in the Temple.  In the sacristy the window gives us St. Martha with Jesus and her sister Mary.  In the tower office above the narthex, lancet windows are luminous with images of Our Lady of Guadalupe, St. Francis of Assisi, and St. Stephen, Deacon and Martyr.   A few windows remain to be installed (in the vestry and one in tower) and other appointments will no doubt be added over time.  Like the souls it is intended to sanctify, the church building is a work in progress, and its fixtures, furnishings, and appointments will grow and change as this parish stretches out its life on the path of grace and the road of its ecclesial pilgrimage.    

            Though raised to the glory of God alone, this parish offers its deepest gratitude to the countless people whose time, talents, resources, and labor made possible this mighty work.  In thanksgiving for a wealth of graces, ranging from the support of Archbishop Fiorenza and the Archdiocesan community to the work of artisans and craftsmen from around the world and the generous gifts of numerous donors and benefactors, we bid blessings for all the human agents and instruments of Our Lady’s love and favor.

 

                             

BLESSED be thy Name, O Lord, that it hath pleased thee to put into the hearts of thy servants to erect this House to thine honour and worship.  Bless, O Lord, them, their families, and their substance, and accept the work of their hands; and grant that all who shall enjoy the benefit of this pious work may show forth their thankfulness by making a right use of the same, to the glory of thy blessed Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

 

LAUS DEO
 

Appendix 1

The Program of Stained Glass Windows

in the new church of Our Lady of Walsingham

 

The Tower Office

1- Our Lady of Guadalupe
2- St. Francis of Assisi
3- [St. Cecilia ~ not yet done]
4- St. Stephen, Deacon & Martyr

The Narthex

5- St. Clare of Assisi
6- The Raven Window

The Clerestory ~ Archangels

7- Angel of Providence [Zadkiel]
8- Angel of Wisdom [Jophiel]
9- Angel of Prophecy [Uriel]
10- St. Michael Archangel
11- Guardian Angels
12- Angel of Comfort [Chamael]
13- St. Raphael Archangel
14- St. Gabriel Archangel

The Nave

15- Christ the Good Shepherd (in the Confessional)
16- Jesus Presenting the Keys of the Kingdom to Peter\
17- The Resurrection Appearance
18- Jesus Receiving the Children
19- The Presentation in the Temple (in the Bride’s Room)
20- The Wedding at Cana
21- The Holy Family in Joseph’s Workshop
22- The Visitation

The Martyrs Chapel

23- The Baptism of Jesus
24- Rose Window of the Holy Ghost and the Apostles

The Holy House

25- The Return of the Holy Family from Egypt to Nazareth
26- Our Lady of Walsingham Enthroned in Glory

The Sacristy

27- St. Martha with Jesus and her sister Mary

The Vestry

28 – [St. Vincent, Patron of Servers ~ not yet done]

The Apse ~ Sanctuary

29 – The Annunciation
30- The Nativity & Adoration of the Shepherds & Magi
31- Apparition of Our Lady at Walsingham to Richeldis