St Therese Holy Icon in Russicum seminarian's chapel
The iconostasis at Our Lady of Fatima Byzantine Church in SF was fashioned, I've been told by a number of people, after the iconostasis in Russicum seminarian's chapel [carmelitereview.org]. It has a western saint on it, Saint Thérèse of Lisieux for this reason. Recent posts about the Russicum prompted one of our parishioners to share a photo of the Saint Thérèse icon on the Russicum iconostatis.
The iconostasis at Our Lady of Fatima Byzantine Church in SF was fashioned, I've been told by a number of people, after the iconostasis in Russicum seminarian's chapel [carmelitereview.org]. It has a western saint on it, Saint Thérèse of Lisieux for this reason. Recent posts about the Russicum prompted one of our parishioners to share a photo of the Saint Thérèse icon on the Russicum iconostatis.
Grazie mille! Those videos really brought tears to my eyes. I can tell you our prishoners will be very pleased with this additional material! Again, thank you!
It's also interesting that the information on iconographer Gregorij highlighted his commission to paint Francesco, the patron saint of our fair city. I was just at the Shrine of St. Francis and the wonderful Porziuncola Nuova [knightsofsaintfrancis.com] on Wed. for the Latin Church's celebration of the Feast of the IC.. Our own pastor Fr Eugene is himself a Franciscan OFM, We celebrated a Panikhida at the Porziuncola Nuova [tinyurl.com] on their Feast of All Souls a year ago.
This reminds me of an article I found on an UOC-MP website that attacked something a UOC-KP parish was doing.
The KP parish website had an article on St Clare of Assisi and the MP site basically affirmed that, "See people, those KP-ers are promoting veneration of a Western saint etc."
In fact, both St Therese and St Clare (and other Western Catholic saints) have been favourites among many Orthodox, especially the Russian Orthodox diaspora in France where the penitential devotion of La Salette also became popular among them.
New Skete continues to publish icons of both St Francis and St Clare (last time I looked) and they have yet to be excoriated for that by anyone.
And in the Western Rite of the Antiochian Orthodox Church, the Orthodox Catholic Book of Common Prayer they publish have all sorts of Western post-schism saints in its calendar where it is stipulated that public veneration of these is possible with the approval and blessing of the local bishop.
There is something about St Therese that transcends our earthly ecclesial walls of separation.
In fact, both St Therese and St Clare (and other Western Catholic saints) have been favourites among many Orthodox, especially the Russian Orthodox diaspora in France where the penitential devotion of La Salette also became popular among them...There is something about St Therese that transcends our earthly ecclesial walls of separation.
Helene Iswolsky writes about it in her book, Light before Dusk: A Russian Catholic in France. She was surprised to see many Russian Orthodox Christians having images of Saint Thérèse alongside their icons. Then there is the acount of the Russian taxi-driver who ran out of gas while driving on a lonely road. After praying to Saint Thérèse, he found the gas tank miraculously full!
Father Alexander Elchaninov, a Russian Orthodox priest in France, recommended his people read about the life of Saint Thérèse.
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