Original artwork encourages prayer as it travels to homes in Hurricane area
HURRICANE — Responding to the call to join Catholic parishes across the United States as they engage in the second phase of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops three-year Eucharistic Revival, St. Paul Catholic Center in Hurricane created a Eucharistic image that parishioners can have visit their home for a week.
The original watercolor also is reproduced on prayer cards that have been distributed to St. Paul parishioners.
The image was painted by Deacon Dan Weber, who also wrote the prayer contained on the cards.
Although the deacon created the artwork, the idea came from Suzie Bledsoe, who is Saint Paul’s administrator. The center is a mission of St. George Parish in St. George; Father David Bittmenn is pastor.
During Easter Bledsoe came across information about the National Eucharistic Revival online, “right around the same time that Fr. Dave Bittmenn asked me about taking the administrator position at St. Paul’s,” she said.
Bledsoe converted from Protestantism to Catholicism in 2013. Understanding the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist at a deeper, more personal level was something she wanted to encourage people to discover for themselves, she said, so she signed herself up as the parish point person for the Eucharistic Revival.
Talking with other parish point persons on a Zoom call, “someone shared about a traveling image that they were using,” she said. “My husband Bill and I had started a traveling crucifix for vocations at our parish in Mesquite, Nev. several years ago, so I knew it was something we could do at our little parish in Hurricane.”
Rather than use a crucifix, Bledsoe asked Deacon Weber if he would consider painting an image because she knew he was an award-winning watercolor artist.
“I only paint in watercolor, so this has always been and will always be my technique,” the deacon said. “Praise be to God for the gift.”
To create the image, Deacon Weber first prayed for God’s guidance, he said. He also invoked Saint Luke, the patron saint of artists.
Then, “I slept and prayed and slept some more, and the vision for this painting materialized in a dream and a daydream,” he said.
The words of the prayer came to him at the same time as the image, he said. “The prayer is the painting, and the painting is the prayer. We cannot have one without the other.”
The painting shows a glass chalice about a quarter full of wine rising from the surface of the Earth, with a pair of heavenly hands about to grasp it. Against a starry background, a white dove holding a communion host hovers over the hands.
The painting reveals only one small area on the surface of the earth, the deacon said. “This small spot is an unseen altar with an unseen corporal on it. On that corporal one Eucharistic celebration is taking place,” during which the unseen priest, in persona Christi, confects the Eucharist and consecrates the bread and wine, he said. “What is seen in my painting are all things which are normally unseen. So, the painting presents the seen as unseen and the unseen as seen.”
Describing the image, he said, “The hands are the agape hands of God the Father, the dove at the top signifies the presence and action of the Holy Spirit. The stars of heaven are momentarily united with the earthly realities of Earth, and the column of fire/smoke or signs thereof in the warm, red-hued clouds of smoke signify the movement of our triune God over the surface of our little planet where we journey.”
The Greek letters “IHS” on the host is an abbreviation for the name of Jesus, he added.
Deacon Weber donated the original watercolor to Bishop Oscar A. Solis.
“Since the image is now the property of the Diocese of Salt Lake, all people in the diocese and beyond may enjoy it,” the deacon said.
The traveling image used by St. Paul Center is an 11 X 14 digital print; this format was chosen because it can be easily replicated and inexpensively framed.
“The hope will be that Catholics are inspired to set the framed print on a tabletop easel and create a small altar in their home. This altar can be the focal point for prayer and reflection on the gift that keeps on giving throughout the parish phase of the Eucharistic Revival and beyond,” Deacon Weber said.
Upon being dismissed from Mass, sometimes “it is so easy to move on through our week and forget what just happened and forget that we are Christ carriers – that we carry the living Body and Blood into the world,” he said. “Our little home altars can help remind us of and recharge us.”
In addition to being distributed to Church members in Hurricane, a few hundred of the prayer cards have been sent to the Utah State Prison in Salt Lake City at the request of Deacon Greg Werking, who is the prison’s assistant chaplain.
In the weeks since St. Paul Center parishioners have been hosting the traveling image of the Eucharist, Bledsoe said she has heard several stories “of answered prayers as they draw closer to our Lord.”
A journal that accompanies the image allows people to share their prayer requests and notes about special events that they are celebrating while hosting the image.
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