St. Mary of the Angels published a 100-page hardbound book containing our answers to questions posed by the Congregation for Divine Worship and Discipline of the Sacraments. Since the questionnaire wanted both text and photos, we combined them into this single format.
This spread in the book answered questions concerning our bell towers. We also wanted to show how they dominate the landscape of our rural city.
The purpose of designating a church as a minor basilica is to recognize the historic, artistic and spiritual importance of the church which has demonstrated its notability or magnificence to the Sacred Congregation entrusted to examine it for the pope. That is technically the goal of the quest. In a profound way, the church must be an example of liturgical and pastoral practices. Therefore, a church must meet certain criteria to be granted this status.
Part of the process includes answering a complicated questionnaire (which is entirely in Latin) with 119 segments exploring not only the physical architecture and appointments of the building but its art, liturgical life, religious devotions, participation of the laity, charitable works and historical relevance. An emphasis is placed on "worthy celebration of the sacred mysteries," as Archbishop Arthur Roche expressed it in his letter to Bishop Malone confirming the granting of the title. And it is through the worthy celebration of the sacred mysteries that the "people of Olean and beyond have their faith confirmed," he wrote.
Therefore, how we conduct Liturgy, not just the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, but the Liturgy of the Hours is examined. The sanctuary is given great scrutiny. How we approach the sacred times of Christmas, Easter, Lent and Advent are treated with considerable attention right down to the way in which we decorate.
Drone photography was able to capture the cruciform shape of the building. Buzz Wenke found Emile Uhlrich's original blueprint designs which we featured (a work of art in itself).
With its great weight placed on dispensing the sacred mysteries, we should not be amazed that the questionnaire involved precise measurements of our confessionals and the depth and breadth of our church building and the particular nature of how the presider's chair is made immovable. (We are indebted to Buzz Wenke for helping with that project!) The quality of everything we use in dispensing the sacraments is put under a bit of a microscope. We presume all who examined the application were impressed with our baptismal font, the tabernacle, the gorgeous marble fixtures and other dignified appointments that our generous ancestors purchased for us more than 100 years ago.
Other segments of the questionnaire involve an exploration of our religious art, in particular devotional art depicting the Blessed Virgin Mary. Naturally, we also emphasized our glorious famous windows, the medallion paintings from 1952, Fr. Hamel's paintings over the side altars and the current spectacular painting of our vaulted ceilings and walls.
More of Emile Uhlrich's blueprint designs here depicting the elegant stone traceries. The principle figures in our windows have clothing elaborately monogramed. We are grateful for art historian, Dr. Karin Krauss, from the University of Chicago for helping us "read" our windows.
Interests in the building itself began with questions about its Consecration which took place in a spectacular Rite at the time which took four hours. The Mass included the presence of the Archbishop (later Cardinal) of New York! These answers gave them a glimpse into the incredible history of our parish as it moved from a frontier church supported by early settlers and missionary priests to the time of the Franciscan missionary priests assigned from St. Bonaventure's College (as they called it at the time) to Fr. Hamel's appointment and becoming an official parish in the diocese to the building of our magnificent building and all that we have done over the decades to preserve and enhance this precious edifice built for the glory of God.
Our original photo of Emile Uhlrich during the construction of the building in 1913-14.
Indeed, our history included a spectacular cast of characters who visited, ministered or worshiped here--from legendary Cardinals and bishops in the American hierarchy to home-grown priests who gained national notoriety to Louis Zamparini to Venerable Msgr. Nelson Baker to Thomas Merton. Much of this magnificent history has been secretly hiding in places like the Olean Public Library (particularly the newspapers on microfilm and its collection of City Directories), the Olean Historical Society's large binders, the archive boxes at St. Bonaventure University, a collection of books detailing the history of the diocese and the development of the university. Of course, our own archives released incredible stories long-forgotten as well. We thank parishioners John Gerringer and Laurie McCarthy for sorting and cataloging so much of this material which made for pleasant research.
However spectacular our history is, it is our works of charity and our charitable associations in which we take particular pride. These elements too we detailed in the Application.
Photography was critical and hiring drone photography to get necessary aerial shots demonstrates the lengths to which we went in providing support for our answers to various questions. We are indebted to our parishioner, Darrell Gronemeier, who took charge of most of the standard photography needed, for this Application required dozens of pictures of every element put on display for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops who had to give their approval before sending the Application on for the Holy See's examination. Darrell is a pretty humble guy and would just say that the church and everything in it is photogenic in its own right. Many of Darrell's breathtaking photos for the Application are featured in this website!
A sample of Darrell Gronemeier's glorious photography and Buzz Wenke's staging of the pew missals (which he does as a special touch for our parishioners every week anyway).
Charged with the task of overseeing the application process including the publication of the Application was our parishioner, Jennifer Kane. She holds a BA in Journalism and an MA in English (an alumna from St. Bonaventure University) and is grateful to Fr. Greg for the opportunity to use this unusual project to capitalize on her interests in history, art and liturgy, not to mention writing. "It was a complete blessing-- every step of this journey, whether we were granted the title or not." she said.
See our Timeline for the complete steps in the Application process.