Stella Maris, Our Lady, Star of the Sea
In 2007, plans were underway for renovations, including a new chapel, in the undercroft of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Little Flower in San Antonio. Fr. John Suenram, OCD, the pastor, approached the Emil Frei Company of St. Louis. In 1955, the Frei company had installed the Basilica’s stained-glass windows depicting the lives of St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross.
In discussion about plans for new windows in the undercroft, Fr. John told them he was hoping they had a designer who might be able to produce the caliber of work evident in those windows installed 53 years earlier.
Fr. John discovered to his surprise that the very designer of those windows, Rodney Winfield, was still active at age 83 as an artist with the Frei company, and that he was available to design another set for the Basilica.
The ten windows lining each side of the nave had been Winfield’s first major stained-glass design project for Frei. The six windows installed in Basilica’s undercroft in 2007 were one of the artist’s last commissions.
The Stella Maris window, a transom window over an exterior entry to the undercroft, honors the Blessed Mother. Translated from Latin as “Star of the Sea,” Stella Maris is an ancient title for Our Lady. The set of Gothic-style windows for the new St. Elias adoration chapel depict five scenes from the life of St. Elijah.
When the undercroft’s new windows were blessed on Jan. 22, 2008, Mr. Winfield attended the ceremony with Stephen Frei, the Frei company’s fourth-generation president. Founded in 1898, the Frei company is one of the nation’s most respected artisanal stained glass firms. It is now under its fifth generation of family management. Mr. Winfield, who worked with four of those five generations, was one of Frei’s most celebrated designers. The artist passed away last December at age 92.
One of Mr. Winfield’s best-known works is the “Space Window” in the National Cathedral in Washington, DC. A lunar rock donated by the Apollo 11 crew is embedded in the window, which commemorates man’s first steps on the moon.
The Basilica’s “Rose Window” was a donation from the Frei company upon completion of the St. John and St. Teresa windows. The round window in the main dome presents 24 roses, for the 24 years of St. Thérèse’s life. The roses appear to be suspended in air, as a representation of her famous promise to let fall “a shower of roses” from heaven after her death by doing good upon earth. The Frei company also produced in the late 1930s the five windows in the Tomb Chapel of St. Thérèse, presenting 17 stories from the life of the saint, and the set of 10 upper windows in the church nave.
The Basilica was built with the contributions of over 6,000 donors from around the country during the Great Depression and dedicated in 1931. It was designated a Basilica in 1998 by St. John Paul II.
Article first published in the Apostolate of the Little Flower Vol. 86, No. 4