Sacred Heart Church 811 S Latah St Boise, ID

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2 Sacred Heart Church 811 S Latah St Boise, ID

3 INTRODUCTION On the 50 th anniversary of the Church of the Sacred Heart on June 14, 2003, Diane Ronayne wrote a tribute to the parish. This is part of that tribute as published in the Idaho Statesman. Legend has it that a man named Tommy Dolan once rescued an Indian woman near a swamp on the Boise bench. In a confrontation with the assailants, Tommy was killed. Later the swamp was drained. In the 1950s, the site became the Sacred Heart parish grounds at the corner of Latah and Cassia streets. A young, Irish priest was called to the Whitney Bench, west of Vista Avenue, to shepherd the new parish. While the building was going up, Father James Hallissey conducted Sunday mass at a nearby movie house, the Vista Theater (now Bruneel Tire Co.). The cornerstone was placed in November 1952 for the modified Gothic-style red brick edifice with cast-stone trim, spacious enough to seat 600. It was the first church in Boise to boast radiant heating, architect Frank Hummel said. A 60-foot steeple crowned the $150,000 building, which was dedicated June 14, Barely missing a beat, Sacred Heart parishioners launched a fund-raising campaign in 1954 to build a parochial school for their 450 children. In 1958, Bishop James Byrne blessed the new school for first- to eighth-graders, staffed by Sisters of St. Benedict, who lived in a former boarding house that had been moved next door. By 1965, when Fr. Hallissey celebrated his 25 th year of priesthood, Sacred Heart was the largest parish in the diocese of Idaho. Reprinted with permission Understanding the design and art of the Church of the Sacred Heart begins with some background on the parish. It was the fourth Catholic parish in the city of Boise, with sections f S C d l S M d O L d f p d to the new community. The rapidly growing Boise Bench was its home. But the person who created Sacred Heart and viewed it as the splendor of his architectural accomplishments was the third Bishop of Boise, Edward J. Kelly. He wanted the new church, second in size only to the Cathedral, to be a splendid edifice. Bishop Kelly had a particular devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and this was an important theological foundation which guided many of the decisions about the building of the church. This is the theology of what it means to be church and the role of the devotion of the Sacred Heart in the Church. The devotion to the Sacred Heart is one of the most popular in Roman Catholicism, especially in the years before Vatican II. The devotion is especially concerned with what the Church deems to be the love and compassion of the heart of Christ towards humanity, especially for those who endure suffering. It is not a devotion found in the first ten centuries of the Church, but began to come into Church life with the return of the crusaders to Europe and was led by Saint Bernard of Clairvaux and Saint Francis of Assisi. The devotion, often called the Holy Wounds, was picked up and spread by the religious orders, especially the Franciscans and Benedictines. The modern form of the devotion came from the life of Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque ( ), a French nun. She said that Jesus had appeared to her and wanted a devotion to his Sacred Heart. He gave her specific instructions on how this was to be done, including reception of Holy

4 Communion on the first Friday of every month, special holy hours on Thursday, and the creation of a feast of the Sacred Heart. From that time on various other visionaries reinforced what she has said, and gradually a series of popes increased Church approval of devotions to the Sacred Heart especially the first Friday devotions. In 1856, Pope Pius IX extended the feast of the Sacred Heart to the universal Church. Pope Leo XIII consecrated the whole human race to the Sacred Heart and this was confirmed by Pope Pius X. Pope Pius XII wrote an encyclical on the Sacred Heart for the 100 th f IX bl of the feast. Bishop Kelly had studied in Rome and was well acquainted with the traditional practices there honoring the Sacred Heart. He had a special interest in promoting the first Friday practices. And he was aware that Pope Pius XII had made known that an encyclical was coming about the Sacred Heart. His choice of Sacred Heart for his new church was based on all of these factors. The question facing him was how he was going to honor the Sacred Heart. His choice was to use the Litany of the Sacred Heart. I l 5 g w w ld C l C l f Second Vatican Council could not have been imagined. The placement of the pews, the position of the altar, and every other aspect of the church was focused upon having people be able to be in the church, looking forward, while Mass was being celebrated. S M C d b b l 3 w l l w ld b p d gl w d w S M d l ll dallions of stained glass. For the new Sacred Heart church, Bishop Kelly was determined to have large and spectacular stained glass windows devoted to the Litany of the Sacred Heart. O C d d g d d d f a litany had become popular. The litany is the repetition of a prayer or a response. Catholic litanies began with the repetition of the Kyrie Eleison during Mass and grew to be what was said or sung during processions. The processions themselves began to be called litanies. In time, specific litanies were developed. Some were rejected by Church authorities, and some were encouraged. One of those most strongly encouraged was the Litany of the Sacred Heart. With all of that as his basis, Bishop Kelly began the design of the church by hiring Hummel Architectural Firm. He appointed Fr. James T. Hallissey to be its first pastor. THE ORIGINAL CHURCH The church was built with its main doors facing Latah Street, which was a much more narrow street then, with a large sidewalk space. To the south of the church was the two story rectory and between them was a driveway leading to the back of the rectory. The front of the church, the entire north side, and the west side parking lot were asphalt, called by Fat Q l f l p f I g l l w or trees were in front of the rectory. Entering the church through one of the four glass filled doors there was a small vestibule, under a large choir loft. On one side were the stairs leading to the loft, on the other side was a small rest room. Going through another set of glass filled doors was the main church itself. It stretched all the way to the sanctuary and altar at the other end. It was in some ways similar to other churches built by Bishop Kelly, but w j d ff S M d S ll

5 had steel beams covered in wood, held up by steel beams hidden behind the plaster walls. Sacred Heart and later Holy Rosary in Idaho Falls had the new and revolutionary manufactured wooden beams, starting at the floor on either side and meeting at the top of the church. This allowed the church to be much wider than had been possible earlier. Between the beams, the ceiling was made of strips of cedar wood. Along the back wall of the church behind the pews on either side were confessionals, with a center place for the priest and a space on either side for people going to confession. There was a third confessional half way up the church on the north side. Also on the north side was a setback area which was the baptistery. After the church was dedicated, Father Hallissey put in plaques of the devotion known as the Seven Dolors or Seven Sorrows of Mary on the walls of the baptistery. This was a form of piety that was very popular in the Middle Ages but not so in more modern times. It was a special d f H ll S d H f f w d complete set of the stations of the Seven Sorrows or the Seven Dolors. While it was hard to see, the original floor actually was a gentle slope all the way to the sanctuary, a slope of about 15 inches. The purpose of this was to give a better view to people in the back. The church had two heating systems. The main system was radiant heat in the floor itself, with additional steam heated radiators along the walls to be used if needed. There was a coal fired furnace in the basement providing the heat to both systems. As was common at the time, there was no air conditioning. The lighting for the church was also a new idea, fluorescent lights on the altar facing the side of each beam. The only incandescent lights were in the sanctuary area. The walls of the church were painted a soft pink, a color intended to be best for use with the fluorescent lights, and also intended to draw the viewer to the more colorful sanctuary. The sanctuary itself was dominated by a very large black marble altar, on a three step platform. There were two steps at the communion rail gates, leading up to a large space before the steps to the altar platform. There were three chairs against the wall on the south side of the sanctuary. The tile of the sanctuary floor was red, with a thick yellow carpet leading up the steps from the gates of the communion rail to the top of the altar platform. The sanctuary walls were painted a soft purple. On top of the altar was a large golden tabernacle. Behind the large black marble altar was a very wide pink marble slab extending to the ceiling with a large crucifix upon it. On either side of the altar were two life size plaster statues, one of Saint Joseph and one of Saint Anthony of Padua. The entire sanctuary area, inside the wooden communion rail, was boxed shaped with doors on either side leading to the two sacristies. Both sacristies were exceptionally large so that they could be and were used as classrooms and meeting rooms until the school was built. The two sacristies were connected by a walkway behind the altar. In the open space between the communion rail and the walls of the sacristies were two side altars, both again made from the black marble. On one was a plaster statue of the Virgin Mary and on the other a plaster statue of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Outside the communion rail on both sides were small doors leading outside. Bishop Kelly had ensured that the church had stained glass windows. They were designed partly by Bishop Kelley and p l b H l C S S d C l g l

6 were finalized in design and made by the Rambusch Company in New York and are commonly called the Rambusch windows. At the top of the choir loft, over the entrance doors was a window that was a depiction of the Assumption of Mary surrounded by the angels. At first it seemed to be a surprising choice of subject, since in a church dedicated to Christ himself a window with him would be expected. But the doctrine of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary had been dogmatically defined by Pope Pius XII on November 1, 1950, in one of the only uses of papal infallibility. Bishop Kelly wanted to honor the dogmatic definition of this doctrine by placing a window of the Assumption in the first church he built since the definition. He wrote and informed the Vatican that he had done so. All the windows along the walls on both sides were scenes from the life of Christ, for example, the Crucifixion, the Agony in the Garden, the Nativity, and the Annunciation. The Rambusch windows were meant b l g d l L f S d H x pl H f f d w b f V g M b H l G E w d w d H b p of the Litany of the Sacred Heart. One thing of note is that the window of Jesus and the Children, now in the Day Chapel, has one of the few depictions of the bare foot of Jesus. When the design for this window was sent to Bishop Kelly, he did not like the design of the foot, so he took off his own shoe and had the diocesan chancellor trace his foot. He gave the tracing S w d f l k f H k f his foot to the Rambusch Company in New York and said he wanted this foot used as the foot of Jesus. So this is a stained glass picture of the actual foot of Bishop Kelly himself. The church, dedicated by Bishop Kelly in 1953, was indeed his splendid edifice. There was some criticism of the color scheme and of the use of the florescent lights, but overall, especially because of the pl d d d gl w d w w w d b f l f 5 THE RENOVATION AND REMODELING OF THE CHURCH The parish of Sacred Heart continued to grow along with all of Boise. Sacred Heart School was opened in 1958 and a second school, Sacred Heart Mission School was opened in 1967 on Cole Road. The p w pl d S M k p w bl ed on the site of the Mission School as its home. In that same year Father Hallissey and many other priests who had been in their parishes for a long time were all transferred. It was a difficult time for all the parishes involved, and especially for Sacred Heart. The new pastor was Father John Donoghue. In 1972 Father Thomas Faucher (the author of this writing) was named as associate pastor and served at Sacred Heart under Father Donoghue until It was a busy time for the parish, but also a diff l bl f S M k d reduced the parish income by over half. And the liturgical changes ordered by Vatican II were sometimes difficult in the existing church building. From 1962 until 1966 the bishops had met in Rome at the Second Vatican Council. They had eventually made a large number of changes to the Church, and these included changes in Church liturgy, ceremonies, and prayer. The theology behind these changes was to make the liturgy much closer, both physically and spiritually, to the people. This included having Mass and the sacrament celebrated in local languages, the altars moved to face the people, lay readers of the scriptures and lay ministers of the Eucharist. The emphasis was no longer on the priest but on the people. The church buildings were not to be long and narrow, but short and wide.

7 This meant that every church had to be modified and changed for the new liturgy. In most parishes this was done in two stages over many years. The first stage was just temporary fixes, and the second stage was a complete renovation of the church building itself. This is exactly what happened to Sacred Heart. Father Hallissey had put a temporary altar in the open space in the sanctuary and moved the chairs in front f bl k bl l p w d f b k f f w l g p kl j pl d f f d l f S d H b d f b p D g d architect Charles Hummel, whose family firm had designed the original Sacred Heart with Bishop Kelly about ideas for a renovation of the church. But the problems seemed overwhelming. Father Faucher was moved to Emmett in 1976, and Father Donoghue was moved in While in Emmett Father Faucher, who had training in liturgy and architecture, oversaw the renovation and expansion of the church there, with Charles Hummel as the architect. After Father Donoghue left., Father David Kundtz was appointed pastor and in 1979 made a request to leave. A search for his replacement was made and it was recommended to Bishop Sylvester Treinen that Father Faucher return as the pastor. Upon his appointment, one of his instructions from Bishop Treinen was to remodel the church building as soon as possible. Father Faucher accepted this goal of the renovation of Sacred Heart Church, and also the grounds and other building on the site. A building committee was established. Ultimately plans were made for a parish hall, a park behind the school, and the renovation of the church building itself. In regard to the church building, a list of needs and priorities emerged: Latah Street had been constantly widened at the expense of the sidewalk in front of the church. It had become dangerous with the entrance to the church so close to the street. The long distance from the back pews to the altar failed to meet the liturgical requirements of Vatican II. The inadequacies of the sanctuary itself for the revised liturgy. The lack of any real narthex or lobby for the church. A new baptism area which would allow full immersion baptism A chapel for daily Mass A Blessed Sacrament Chapel Interior physical changes: Elimination of the florescent lights & leveling the floor Exterior physical changes: New entrance, landscaping, etc. Removal of asphalt on north, west, and south sides of the church Handicap accessibility into the church Father Faucher and Mr. Hummel began to re-design the church. The decision was made to reorient the church from the original east to west to a new orientation of north to south. This put the main entrance on the west side of the church facing the parking lot and the school, with a large narthex and a new sanctuary behind the west wall where the original altar had been. The theology behind their decisions was based on the original theological foundations established by Bishop Kelly, but with all of the requirements of Vatican II for good liturgy. Thus the whole importance of the devotion to the Sacred Heart would be maintained, as much of the physical material used in the original

8 church would be used again, and the importance of stained glass would be paramount. Contact was made and an agreement was concluded with the Lupkin Stained Glass Company of Indianapolis to craft the new windows, being true to the Rambusch style of the original windows. Fr. Faucher designed all the new windows. During this time a large fund raising campaign was begun to enable all of this to happen. In her 2003 l f Id S D w I gg M d g lk -Thon k k d ff d $45 d l The physical renovation of the church building began in the winter of , with Mass being moved to the parish hall/school gymnasium for over six months. The new church was finished and dedicated by Bishop Sylvester Treinen on June 29, THE DESIGN AND ART OF THE CHURCH OF THE SACRED HEART Each aspect and part of the renovated church was selected and designed with particular care. These will be examined and explained. THE SANCTUARY The new sanctuary area of Sacred Heart is a raised platform, three steps high. The altar stands on a terrazzo platform. It is not a form of material that is used very often now, but was once much more common. Terrazzo is composite material made of shaved marble, quartz and other material. It can be polished to a high glow. It comes from antiquity, but was brought into modern prominence in Venice. In the original church there were three altars, the main altar and two side altars. In the old convent there had also been an altar. Each of these altars, in conformity with the regulations at the time, contained relics, bones of saints. Throughout the world each time a new altar was made, the local bishop sent to Rome and asked for a small package of relics and these were placed inside the new altar. There was never any identification of whose relics were placed in the Sacred Heart altar. After Vatican II that practice was discontinued. When an altar was dismantled the old relics were to be taken out of the old altar and buried under a new altar. The relics from the main original altar, from the two side altars, and the convent altar were buried about four feet deep in the ground under where the new altar would be. Then a concrete platform was poured and the terrazzo poured on top of that. The original main altar of Sacred Heart Church was cut down in size allowing for a much smaller main altar than in the original church, and for the pulpit out of that same marble. When the original altar was made in 1953, elaborate crosses were cut into the marble on the four corners of the altar. When the church was dedicated in 1953 the main altar was covered with sacred Chrism as were p l k d w w ll d d p That was the exact sacred space of this church, the altar As a result of Vatican II, the Church changed that entirely. Now on the walls of the church, there are to be markers for sacred space, either 4 or 12 crosses, indicating that d p k k f d Sacred Heart church the original four crosses were cut out from the top of the old altar, and mounted into wooden frames. These framed crosses were hung on the walls of the church with a candle in front of them. Their placement is to say that everything inside of

9 d p w p p f w another link between the old and the new. While the bishop anointed the altar with chrism at the church dedication, other priests went out to the four crosses and anointed them with chrism as well. The new altar itself has the symbol IHS on it a traditional symbol for Christ, coming from Greek and Latin and had been on the front of the original altar. On the new pulpit there is the parish symbol of the Sacred Heart. The design of this sanctuary with the altar on one side and the pulpit on the other and the chair in the middle is a configuration intended to give importance to both the Liturgy of the Word and the Liturgy of the Eucharist, and have a special area for weddings, funerals, and other ceremonies. The chairs that are used are the originals from the church purchased by Bishop Kelly and Fr. Hallissey w w p d 5 pl b d l g l d ff l d different cover. A rug was purchased to match the new cover of the chairs. At the time of the dedication the candlesticks and processional cross were special pieces from various artists. The altar platform at Sacred Heart was the first in the diocese to have a wheel chair ramp. The walls on either side of the window behind the altar are panel walls, with a system of shelving that was a remarkable innovation at the time, wall brackets that allowed a large number of shelving patterns. In 2014 a new crucifix was placed over the sanctuary area. The cross was made by a parishioner and the corpus was donated by the Knights of Columbus. The window behind the altar is in the niche originally formed by one of the confessionals. The design of the window is the Las dg f C f f C p f g ll d f the Church of Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, Turkey. To modern Americans the face seems quite severe. The window depicts the coming of Christ at the end of time. The people shown in the window are, with the exception of Jesus and Mary, not figures in any other windows of the church. A list of more than 30 individuals was made, and from that list 18 were chosen. At the time the window was made, some of them were canonized saints, some were not, and one was still alive.

10 Starting on the upper left: 1. The Blessed Virgin Mary as an older lady 2. St. Scholastica, founder of the Sisters of Saint Benedict representing the Benedictine tradition in the Church 3. Dorothy Day; famous American social worker 4. St. Martin de Porres, lay brother from Peru, the patron of mixed race people and promoter of inter-racial harmony. 5. St. Dymphna representing the Irish heritage in the world. She is also the patroness of those who are victims of abuse. 6. St. Paul Miki represents the oriental heritage in the world, specifically Japanese. 7. St. Ignatius of Loyola, the patron of the Basques of Boise and founder of the Jesuits; 8. St. Rose of Lima representing the peoples of South and Central America, the Caribbean and Mexico. 9. S f C b l k w S k p f b b p d who hold public office On the right side: 10. St. Michael the Archangel. Archangels always have red w g d w g d g the scales of justice. 11. St. Stephen, the first martyr and first deacon, representing the ministry of the deacons in the parish. 12. Oscar Romero, the Archbishop of San Salvador. He was martyred in Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha representing Native Americans and First Peoples. 14. Pope John XXIII, Pope John the Good, representing the whole idea of Vatican II and the wonderful person he was. 15. St. John Vianney, the patron of parish priests; 16. St. Francis Xavier Cabrini is the only canonized saint to actually have ever been in this parish, since she went through it on a train. 17. Father Titus Brandsma, a Carmelite priest killed by the Nazis in World War II, 18. Mother Teresa of Calcutta. Notice that Mother Teresa has a square halo indicating that she was still alive when this window was built. At the time the window was made Dorothy Day, Oscar Romero, Kateri Tekakwitha, Pope John XXIII, Titus Brandsma, and Mother Teresa were not canonized saints. Since then, all of them, except Dorothy Day, have b ff ll z d d l d b z d D D b b d by the archbishop of New York asking for her to be named a saint. They have all been given halos in the window following /Church tradition that a halo can be given when a person is considered by the designer or artist that he or she is a saint. Father Faucher thought they were all saints, so he included the halos in the design. There is an old tradition in the Church that when there is a formal triptych, for example a painting that comes in three parts, the most famous of which is the triptych of the Theotokos with the Magi in a Cologne

11 Cathedral, it is closed during Lent. Following that tradition at Sacred Heart, this window is covered over during Lent. There are no exceptions made. Once it is covered over on Ash Wednesday it is not brought back to light until Easter. THE FLOORS AND THE PEWS The sloping floor of the church was filled in using the level at the old entrance on Latah Street as a guide. The new level went over where the communion rail had been and over one of the two steps onto the old altar platform. The result was a level floor with a one-step rise into the sacristy and the Day Chapel. This was also the level used for the narthex and Baptismal Font area. The pews in the remodeled church are the original pews of the church. The pews were in very good condition, but no longer were in the configuration needed. New pews would be a great expense. Charles Hummel redesigned each pew to fit into the new church. The old straight pews were taken to the Idaho State Penitentiary and redone there. The cutting of them and redoing of them was an incredibly complicated feat, partially because each pew had been designed for the old sloping floor. But the prison inmates did a very good job and the pews have served the church extremely well. There was great risk in having the pews redone at the prison since there was no insurance to cover their loss if something happened to them. Thankfully nothing did. The inmates of the prison came and installed the pews when it was time to do so. There were occasions when released prisoners would bring their family to see the pews which the former inmate had made. This also led to a number of years when inmates at the prison came and worked on other projects at Sacred Heart. THE EAST ALCOVE WINDOWS Having closed the entrance to the church from Latah Street and removed most the choir loft, the question arose about what to do with the former vestibule and the former door openings. The decision was made to replace the former doors with stained glass windows. These windows were to honor and remember the history of the Catholic Church in the city of Boise up to that time. The windows were made by the Lupkin Company, but were not viewed as totally successful, since the submitted designs were not closely followed, resulting in the facial images of the Blessed Virgin Mary in two of the windows being identical. This was also true of the images of the Good Shepherd and the Sacred Heart.

12 But by the time this was realized nothing could be done about that. It was customary in the Middle Ages to depict patronage by having a saint hold the building of which he or she was patron. So the windows in the east alcove are the history of the Catholic Church in Boise. After the first Mass in Boise in 1863, it was still many years until there was a church building. The first church depicted in the windows was built at the corner of 3 rd Street and Jefferson Street and was dedicated to S k I p d C E I b d d w N w Y d I l lasted a week. It is shown here being held by Saint. Patrick. It took a long time for it to be replaced. Churches at the time were named for the person who paid for them to be built. So the second church was built in 1876 on the site of the old church and then moved to the corner of 9 th d ff S w l Elk Cl b w b l I w ll d S b money came from someone named John. When Idaho became a diocese in 1890 this building was the first Catholic Cathedral in Boise. I l p Alphonse Glorieux bought the land south of town at 8 th and Hayes and announced to a city where there were only 250 active Catholics that he wanted to build a cathedral to seat a d I w b g d w pl d l d w d w The next church is the Church of the Good Shepherd which existed from 1919 until It was originally built during the time of Bishop Gorman as a Basque church on the corner of 5 th and Idaho Street. After many years it became the personal chapel of the Bishop. It was closed and decommissioned as a church and made a part of the Chancery Office and Idaho Register Office in It was a very painful time for the Basque community when it ceased to be a church. Now the building still exists but is a commercial building. The fourth church is the Church of Saint Mary of the Immaculate Conception located at 26 th and State Street. It was built in The church was extensively redone and expanded in In 1947, Bishop Edward J. Kelly built a small new church in the Boise suburb, then called South Boise. It was dedicated as Our Lady of the Rosary. At the time the window was made it was still in use but the building was subsequently sold and a new Our Lady of the Rosary was built at another location. In 1953, Bishop Kelly built his splendid edifice as Sacred Heart Church on the Boise bench. The picture of Sacred Heart shows its new opening, but before the colonnade was built on the west side of the church. So it is a picture of the church as it existed on the day of its re-dedication in f f w d w S l C l S d C w f b ld g 5 w parish. Now no longer a parish, it continues to exist to serve the needs of Boise State University students. pl ll p d b ld w S l w l l w d w g l S M k C b l b ld g l g church but still si dj S M k S l l g S M k C b ld g b b l some distance away on Northview Street. All the other Catholic churches in Boise were built after These windows show the history of Boise Catholic Church buildings, which other than the Cathedral, have either vanished or have been extensively redone. They are historic windows, preserving the past. One of the things desired in the windows of the east alcove was that they fit in with the window of the Assumption of Mary above them. The red glass at the top of the window of the Assumption seems to flow down to the outer windows of the history of the City of Boise. They are done in that same shade of red as the background. Directly below Mary, the center has a blue glass the same as is in the upper window. This was an attempt both in design and in color to tie the two sets of windows together, so they would not conflict, but would actually provide one harmonious whole.

13 THE BAPTISMAL FONT WINDOW In the baptismal font area there is a window between the font and the narthex which is of the Baptism of Christ. It is made in four pieces. The upper piece which is an elaborate halo and then the lower piece which has a center focus on Christ, a focus on one side of John the Baptist and a focus on the other side of the Holy Spirit. Some art critics consider this to be the most beautiful of all the windows in the church [Other critics give this honor to one of the Stations of the Cross.] It was crafted by the Lupkin Company from a design submitted to them. This is actually the second stained glass of the Baptism of Christ. When it first came it was entirely too dark. It is an interior stained glass window and could not be viewed. So a second one was made with much lighter glass. The original dark window was sold and installed in a private chapel. The other window in the baptismal font area is one of the Rambusch windows moved and installed on the east side of the baptismal font area. THE VIRGIN MARY ALCOVE WINDOWS The statue of Mary, originally on one of the side altars in the old church, was placed on a new pedestal in what had been the original baptistery. Behind it are two windows which were originally just colored glass. They were turned into stained glass and donated by the Faucher family. The one on the right shows Mary, Joseph and Jesus with Mary as a young woman. The one on the left shows Mary as an older woman. Jesus and Joseph are gone but again she has the same piece of jewelry on and is holding it in the same manner. The small flowers at the bottom of each window are reflective of the Faucher family. Over the years since the new church was dedicated, this alcove has been adjusted and is presently dedicated to the Holy Family with the original statue of Saint Joseph placed in it as well. The stations of the Seven Sorrows of Mary have been retained on the walls. THE STATIONS OF THE CROSS WINDOWS The decision to make the new Stations of the Cross in stained glass was made after much study and discussion. No example of stained glass stations having been made before this could be found. They were made as fourteen doors that divide the Day Chapel from the main church which could be opened to provide additional seating for the main church. The lighting is such that they can be used from either side. From the church side you can flip a switch that lights them from behind; from the day chapel you can flip a switch that lights them from the church side. The stations were designed to be connected by a road, which is at the base of every station. Trying to make the Stations of the Cross very tall vertically was not an easy thing to do. It was managed. Church

14 regulations require that Stations of the Cross must have a wooden cross as part of those stations. Most pl S f C ll w d p I S d H the actual wood of the cross is wood in the middle of the stained glass. To achieve this, petrified wood was obtained from Arizona and cut to fit into the stained glass. Art critics consider all of them to be excellent works of art. Some consider the ninth station to be the finest work of art in the church. [See above on the window of the Baptism of Christ.] THE ORIGINAL RAMBUSCH WINDOWS As the design of the new church came into focus there was a great deal of attention given to the placement of the original Rambusch windows. On the south side of the church there had been five windows honoring: the Crucifixion, the Agony in the Garden, the Nativity, the Annunciation, and The Keys of the Kingdom. On the north side were four windows: The Last Supper, the Epiphany, Jesus with the Children, and the Resurrection. Three of these windows had to be moved, which is a very difficult thing to do. Special glass experts were called in to accomplish this. The window of Jesus with the Children and the window of the Epiphany were moved to newly cut window openings in the Day Chapel and the window of the Keys was turned and placed as the side window of the baptismal font. The Rambusch windows had been and continue to be one of the most important parts of the beauty of the Church of the Sacred Heart. All the new stained glass was designed and crafted to fit into the beautiful historic windows of the Litany of the Sacred Heart which have formed the walls of the church for over 60 years. THE NARTHEX The decision to make a totally new main entrance to the church from the west parking lot provided an opportunity to make a large lobby or narthex for the church. The space available for the new entrance and narthex was between the south wall of the sacristy of the old church and a line going west from the outside wall of the rectory. The plan called for a new parish hall to be built behind the rectory with its entrance from the narthex. A series of steps were made from the west parking lot to an outside covered porch leading to the doors of the narthex. From this porch was a door to a newly constructed basement hall. The narthex was a large lobby like room with the old sacristy wall on the left and the doors to the eventual parish hall on the right. The east end of the narthex had doors into the Prayer Garden and a door leading to the rest rooms and parish offices in the old rectory. Some years later the old rectory was torn down and a new office complex put up in its place. One piece of notable art in the narthex is a portable iconostasis, located between the two main doors, which was donated to the Church of the Sacred Heart by Father Michael Miles. In the eastern Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church an iconostasis is the screen between the congregation and the altar. It is covered with images of saints. When there is a Mass that is not held in a regular church, regulations require the use of a portable iconostasis. THE BAPTISMAL FONT On the north side of the narthex are doors leading through the Baptismal Font into the main church. It was intended to be a bright colorful space with a skylight and hanging plants. The south and east wall of the area

15 are stained glass windows. The focal point of the area is the baptismal font itself. The baptismal font was designed with eight sides which recall the eighth day, the first day of resurrection. Saint Augustine writes about "the Day of the Lord, an everlasting eighth day." Christian tradition always had an eight sided font, with steps on one side leading into it, a center space used for the baptism, and steps on the other side leading out. Some ancient baptismal fonts had a waterfall on the side of the central space and baptism was done by the use of the waterfall. The three steps in represent the death to sin in baptism, and the three steps out represent the rising to new life in Christ through the waters of baptism. Because Sacred Heart Church did not have the room for steps on both sides, the lower pool where immersion baptism is done, has just three steps and the person being baptized walks in and out using the same steps. The waterfall is used for the baptism. The upper pool from which the waterfall moves to the lower pool can and is used for baptisms of infants. The upper pool also serves as the source of Holy Water which people use to bless themselves as they enter the church. It has a full heating system to heat the water when needed. The Baptismal font was made from the large pink marble slab that formed the floor to ceiling backdrop of the original church of the Sacred Heart over the original altar. It is another example of how much of the original church material was reused in the new church. THE RECONCILIATION ROOM Confessionals have been replaced in Catholic churches by reconciliation rooms where a person going to confession has the option of being anonymous or having face-to-face confession. Reconciliation rooms are expected to have some art within them. In this room there is a framed handmade needle-point picture of Jesus. It was secretly purchased from a street vendor in Beijing by a parishioner visiting China in He paid $5 for this and he felt that this was just so unfair that he slipped the vendor another $5 besides and the man could not believe it. But this is an example of special Christian art being sold on the black market in China. Had the vendor been caught with the picture or selling the picture at the time he could have gone to prison. It was brought back and framed and it has hung in the reconciliation room ever since. THE DAY CHAPEL The original sanctuary area of the church was totally redone. The back wall and passageway connecting the two sacristies were removed. The new back wall was the east exterior wall of the building. The Day Chapel was built in this space. There were three purposes for having a Day Chapel for the celebration of daily Mass. One, it was expensive to heat the entire church each morning for daily Mass. Mass is in the original church was often very cold. The second purpose was to have the people attending daily Mass sit closer together and not be spread out over the whole church. A third purpose of the Day Chapel was to provide additional seating for the main church if it was needed. The fourteen doors with the Stations of the Cross could be opened and the Day Chapel became part of the main church. The Day Chapel has the technical name of the Chapel of the Children of God. For a variety of reasons it was specifically planned as a chapel to honor the Basque heritage in Idaho, in Boise and at Sacred Heart. There had once been a Basque Church in Boise, the Church of the Good Shepherd. Its closure had been very

16 painful. No parts of the church were saved by the diocese. But a search was begun for any parts of the Church of the Good Shepherd which could be found and a non-catholic woman came forward to say that she had salvaged the original altar in a pile of discarded items and had taken it home. It was in her garage on Warm Springs Avenue. She gave it to Sacred Heart. Local artists took the pieces of the altar, and remade it into a pedestal for a statue. The statue which now stands upon it was hand carved in Markina in Gipukzoa in the Basque country. It is a statue of Our Lady of Begonia which is one of the great images of the Basque region. It was purchased in Markina in 1983 and shipped to Boise. Purchased at the same time and shipped with the statue was a piece which had been a combination of side altar and storage chest in a church in Pamplona. It probably dates from the later 1700s. It is used as the main altar of the Day Chapel. On the front of the altar on the left side there is a monstrance with a host. On the right side there is a cup in the elevation of the Mass. There is also a wheel like symbol called a lauburu, a very traditional Basque symbol. There are also a number of snowflake-like designs. These are again, Basque symbols of divinity. This altar actually opens up and could still be used as a storage area if desired. The altar is on rollers so that it can be moved when the Day Chapel is used for main church overflow seating. The chairs used by the priests are old Basque chairs from various places in the Basque country. Originally there was only one, and then a matching one was given to the parish, and then a third. The credence table is another linen closet from the church in Pamplona. The chairs for the people in the Day Chapel came from a Boise restaurant. On the wall of the Day Chapel is a carved wooden statue of Saint Ignatius of Loyola, the patron of Boise Basques. This statue in the church belongs to the Basque community and is carried in procession once a year by the Oinkari Basque dancers on the Feast of St. Ignatius The lights in the Day Chapel are from the Cathedral of Saint John the Evangelist. When the cathedral was redone in 1977 these original lights became available and Sacred Heart purchased them. They have been in the Day Chapel at Sacred Heart almost longer than they were ever at the cathedral. One of the most important changes in the Day Chapel was the opening of the outside wall for two windows. Window spaces were cut in the brick wall, bringing in much needed natural light. Two windows were moved from the north side of the original church and installed in these openings. One is Jesus and the Children and the other is the Epiphany. They are like the other windows, part of the Litany of the Sacred Heart, all designed by Bishop Kelly and by Rambusch. THE BLESSED SACRAMENT CHAPEL Vatican II and the subsequent document from the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, Environment and Art in Catholic Worship called for churches to have a special chapel for the reservation of the Blessed Sacrament. The decision was made to have this chapel in the space of one of the original sacristies, under the tower of the church. The north wall of the old sanctuary was removed and the tower inside the steeple was opened and plastered. The shutters at the top of the steeple were replaced with windows. The result was a large open space filled with light. A pedestal was constructed in the center of the space and the original tabernacle from the church set upon it. The chapel again used some of the black marble from

17 the main and side altars of the original church. The original plan called for the windows at the top of the Blessed Sacrament tower over the pedestal to be done in a series of colors depicting the story in the book of Revelation where it describes the north, south, east, and west walls of Jerusalem, but the money has never been found to do that. THE PRAYER GARDEN AND GROUNDS On the east side of the narthex, between the church and the rectory had been a driveway. This was removed and a Prayer Garden was constructed. It was designed to be a wheel chair ramp, as well as an entrance into the church. The Prayer Garden also is a place where cremated remains have been buried. g d g l g f S d S l d d w d w 5 g w ld by somebody who wanted to find a new place for them. They were given to Sacred Heart for the Prayer Garden. The money to build the prayer garden was donated by parish members and also the money that was left by a nameless man who killed lf d w ll d U k w d f w donated in memory of one of the children of the parish. All of the asphalt on the east and north sides of the church was removed and grass and trees planted. A planter for flowers was built over the old steps into the church from Latah Street. CONCLUSION Bishop Edward J. Kelly set out to construct a splendid edifice, his crowning achievement as a builder of churches. He did so. His choice of having the dominant feature of the church be magnificent stained glass windows honoring the Litany of the Sacred Heart resulted in a beautiful building. Every well-designed church has special features which set its tone and brings a specialness to it. It is the use of stained glass which did this at the Church of the Sacred Heart. Every effort was made to build on this foundation when the church was remodeled in This effort resulted in both bringing the building into the new era of Vatican II and keeping true to the original goal of Bishop Kelly. The Church of the Sacred Heart is truly beautiful.

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