Legacy etched in memory
Catholic parishes pay homage to martyred priest
Editor’s note: This story is part of “Road to Sainthood,” an ongoing series of stories about the late Rev. Stanley Rother, the first U.S. born male and U.S. priest named a martyr by the Roman Catholic Church. His beatification, at a ceremony planned for Sept. 23 in Oklahoma City, will place him one step closer to canonization.
The compelling story of a dedicated priest comes to life in the vivid colors of stained glass windows at St. Eugene’s Catholic Church, 2400 Hefner Road. A statue depicting an Oklahoma clergyman draws the eye when one enters St. James the Greater Catholic Church, 4201 S McKinley, where it was installed earlier this year.
Both the stained glass windows and the sculpture highlight the life and ministry of the Rev. Stanley Rother.
The artwork is among the ways Oklahoma parishes are paying tribute to Rother, an Okarche native and priest with the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City who was killed
by unknown assailants in 1981 while serving at a Santiago Atitlan, Guatemala, parish.
The Rev. Don Wolf, Rother’s cousin and pastor of St. Eugene’s, said the stained glass windows at his church include images from Rother’s life. These scenes include a picture of the priest in the robe he wore in Guatemala, Rother on his journey to Guatemala and the priest claiming the body of one of his parishioners who was killed. Another scene depicts Rother being shot to death in his parish rectory.
Wolf said the stained glass windows also display scenes from the life of St. Edith Stein, a German Jewish woman who converted to Catholicism. She became a religious sister and was sent to Auschwitz concentration camp where she was killed by the Nazis during the Holocaust. The windows also show the life of Blessed Miguel Pro, a Mexican Jesuit Catholic priest who was killed during the Mexican Revolution.
Wolf said the windows were installed in 2016, allowing the church to tell Rother’s story of faith, love and dedication in a different way.
“Stained glass is always as a reminder. When you are surrounded by beauty, especially when you have the interplay of color and form like that, it affects you in a way that is greater than simply intellectual. You’re not just simply grasping an idea, but you’re experiencing beauty and when you experience beauty,
it opens up your heart and mind in a way that it can’t be opened any other way,” Wolf said.
“That’s why opportunities like those are really important. It’s an opportunity to experience the transcendent, to experience the beyond in a way that you just can’t get to when all you have are white walls and dark ceiling.”
Name recognition
Besides art, parishes cross the state have found other ways to honor Rother.
Perhaps nothing is more significant than naming a building or program in recognition of the priest and his ministry.
Rother’s home parish, Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Okarche, chose to recognize the priest in this way. In June, Holy Trinity named its new administration building in Rother’s honor.
The church already had erected a large statue of the priest, and it has become a well-known symbol of his life and legacy. The statue shows Rother greeting a young girl, based on one of the more popular photographs of the clergyman.
The Rev. John Peter Swaminathan, pastor of Holy Trinity, said the parish decided to name the new building after Rother because parishioners felt it would be a good tribute to the hometown priest. He said the building includes a gift shop that will sell items related to Rother’s life, not for financial purposes but to help promote his legacy.
“Nowadays, there are so many people coming to Okarche, coming to see where Father Rother was born,
where he was baptized, where he attended church, where he attended school and where he grew up on the farm,” Swaminathan said. “The first place they look is Holy Trinity. This is how we can continue to the legacy of Father Rother.”
Other parishes have followed suit.
Rother served at parishes in the Tulsa Diocese for several years and some of them have chosen to honor him by naming a building or another space after him.
A conference room at Christ the King Catholic Church in Tulsa is named after Rother.
Also, St. Benedict Catholic Church in Broken Arrow named the parish’s education center after the priest.
The Rev. Joe Townsend, St. Benedict’s pastor, said the parish thought that the building honor and a painting of the priest created by Broken Arrow artist Patricia King was a great way to recognize Rother’s life and ministry.
He said church members also have found other ways to pay homage to the priest who has inspired them. He said the church has held a Father Stanley Rother Sainthood Walk in the last three years, that starts at his family home in Okarche and ends at what had been his grave site in that city. Townsend said participants would stop several times along the walk to pray for Rother’s canonization. In May, the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City moved Rother’s remains from the Okarche cemetery to an Oklahoma City cemetery.
Townsend said the walk usually is conducted in October, but it will not be held this year because of Rother’s
September beatification ceremony in Oklahoma City.
“We’ve had as many as 300 people for the walk,” he said.
“I preach about it every year around the anniversary of his death, his martyrdom. We wanted all of our parishioners, especially those who didn’t grow up with him, to know about him and we wanted to keep his memory alive to the Catholic Church in Oklahoma.”
Meanwhile, the Spanish language and cultural institute at St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, 421 E Acres in Norman, was renamed the Father Stanley Rother Hispanic Cultural Institute in 2010. The institute offers Spanish language and cultural studies classes for community members.
The institute’s founder, Maria de Jesus Ruiz, University of Oklahoma professor emeritus of Spanish, said then-Oklahoma City Archbishop Eusebius Beltran visited the institute and discussed Rother’s ministry.
She said she and other institute leaders were struck by Rother’s willingness to learn the Spanish language and become immersed in the culture of his Guatemalan parishioners. Rother, who had trouble learning Latin, not only learned how to speak Spanish but eventually translated the Bible into the native language of his parishioners.
“He built bridges between cultures. He exemplified the love and respect for other cultures and languages which our Catholic faith calls us to have,” Ruiz said of Rother.
“We were so inspired that all of us said we should renamed the institute after this man.”