Featured Renovation Projects

OUR LADY’S HEALING CENTER

Our Lady’s Healing Center at Stella Maris Ranch was established in 2022 at a former hunting and fishing lodge on the gulf coast of Texas, along a secluded stretch of the San Antonio Bay. A private dining room provided the optimal setting for a new chapel. Inspired by and envisioned to complement the painted churches of Texas also in the diocese of Victoria, the new chapel features a gothic design with custom furnishings provided by Little Way Construction and new stained glass with spiritual and physical healing scenes from the Gospels by Foster Stained Glass. The scenes of Christ’s Baptism and Transfiguration flank the high altar in the sanctuary, highlighting the power of the sacred liturgy to draw humanity into the powerful transformation of life in Christ. Two additional clerestory windows feature scenes from Tobit related to a principal patron of healing, St. Raphael. A stained glass transom above the single entry door recalls the words of the prayer before communion: only say the word and my soul shall be healed.

A unique feature of the chapel is a large clear glass window with a custom folding wood shutter, designed to allow overflow in tandem with the entry door propped open for overflow seating in the adjacent dining area, which approximately triples the capacity of the intimate chapel itself, which seats about 20-30. Custom marble flooring with mosaic inserts also ornament the richly appointed sanctuary, flanked by votive shrines, with an altar rail serving as a kneeler along the sides. Text along the upper register names Our Lady by several titles, including Stella Maris.

Future murals by New Jerusalem Studios will honor the Blessed Mother in her Coronation in the large roundel medallion on the front wall flanked by peacocks, Christ the Divine Physician on the back wall, and the four Evangelists on the sloped ceilings. Along with additional future decorative stencil work currently under development by Robert Puschautz and studio, additional niches for votives featuring various saints associated with healing will eventually infill back and side walls.

Dedicated May 2, 2024

Read about this project in Liturgical Arts Journal here.