Here’s a question that people have asked. Not one of the twenty questions, but it’s important for me to answer. The question: What happened to the statue of Mary at St. Boniface? The one we use for the May crowning?

Simple answer: the statue’s in the lounge, a room that was notable for its crowd of priestly portraits and its lack of sacred images. I’m glad to balance things a little bit by shifting an image of the Mother of God into that space.

But, why the move? Two answers. First, Vatican II urges to take care about the number and placement of images of the Virgin and the saints in churches. Ideally, we should one of any particular person. The narthex at St. Boniface, a relatively small space, has rather a lot of images of Mary— the bronze icon, the Pieta, an image of Our Lady of Czestochowa, two small ceramic pieces. Add to that the wood carving of the Holy Family and a whole series of stained glass dedicated to her.

Second has to do with art. The Church privileges original art, paintings, and sculptures that bear the imprint of a human hand. The bronze work in this church— crucifix, stations, icons of Mary and St Boniface—are original works. They speak a value that factory-produced images don’t. It’s the same reason I prefer the hand-made crucifix from St. Lawrence for our veneration on Good Friday. These works not only show us the sacred, but they connect to the creative spirit of the artists who crafted them.