Oratory Tour

A painted frieze pattern of grazing sheep and goats forms a lower band under the Bible of Poor panels on either side of the nave, alluding to the flocks mentioned in the Song of Songs and to the faithful followers of Christ, who like sheep follow the Good Shepherd wherever He goes.  In relation to the sculpture of the Lord reigning from the Cross as the Tree of Life, those who enter the Oratory find themselves between the sheep and the goats described in Jesus’ parable in Matthew 25:31-46, entering into and passing through His divine judgment separating sin from the sinner.

Further, the forty “Bible of the Poor” panels supported by this decorative wood construction also reproduce an even more detailed lattice pattern.  Each of the panels contains a central scene from the life of Christ, flanked on either side by two Old Testament prefigurations of it.  These wooden panels were hand-drawn in India ink by a local Fort Wayne artist, Aaron Minier, to reproduce the style of the medieval woodcut scenes detailing the life and love of the Lord for the believing soul, from the Annunciation to the Last Judgment.  The Bible of the Poor panels in the Oratory are a new adaptation and arrangement of Biblical scenes and verses designed to include both the twenty mysteries of the Rosary, as well as fourteen scenes from the Passion and saving Death of Christ which could serve as a Way of the Cross devotion.  The labeling of the Bible of the Poor panels---in groups of two or three, depending on their placement on a given side of the Oratory windows---takes the form of a Litany of the Lord’s Loveliness, allowing the descriptions of the scenes to form short prayers addressed to the Lord with a variety of salutations declaring His beauty: