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A Reredos in Honor of St. Josemaria

On Sunday the 21st of January, in the Royal Church of St. James (the parish of the Escrivá family during their stay in Logroño), a new reredos dedicated to St. Josemaría was blessed. The ceremony was presided over by Bishop Carlos Escribano Subias, of the diocese of Calahorra and La Calzada-Logroño, accompanied by Bishop Daniel Fernández Torres of Arecibo, Puerto Rico, and the Vicar of Opus Dei for La Rioja and Aragón, Pablo Lacorte Tierz. Also taking part were other priests and seminarians, as well as a large group of faithful.

This is the parish church St. Josemaría attended during his years in Rioja. His brother Santiago was baptized there and his father’s funeral was celebrated there. The new reredos is next to a statue of Our Lady of Hope, patroness of the city.

The ceremony began with the blessing of the reredos composed mainly of an oil painting by Isabel Guerra; it has been placed in a side chapel that the many pilgrims walking the “Camino of Santiago” will see as soon as they enter the church. In the homily, Bishop Escribano described the event that gave rise to the vocation of the founder of Opus Dei, represented in a bas-relief by Diana García Roy located below the painting. The bishop asked those who will seek the intercession of St. Josemaría in front of this new painting to pray for priestly vocations and for the apostolic mission of the diocese.

Romana, n. 66, January-June 2018, p. 145.

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