Featured Window

Our Lady of Grace, Dearborn Heights, Michigan

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MSGC : Collections : Window

Window

Building Name: Cathedral of St. Paul

Studio Name: Lamb (J. and R.) Co.

City: Detroit

Window Shape: 3 (arched)

Date of Window: 1979

Subject/Title of Window: North Clerestory Bay 3-Moses

Brief Description of Subject: Clerestory Windows

Each of the North Clerestories are named for a "Type of Christ" --- a person or an event which foreshadows or prefigures is some way, Christ, or an event in the life of Christ. The artist has chosen to illustrate this with a montage using material found in the cited scriptures below.

Moses

Like the Christ, Moses led his people from the slavery of Egypt (sin) to the Promised Land (the promise of Eternal Life). In the dividing and crossing of the Red Sea, water is again seen as both a destructive and life-receiving element (as it was in the story of Noah). The Israelites were nurtured by manna in the desert; Christ sustains his people by the gift of his body in the Eucharistic bread. The water which sprang forth from the rock (at Moses' prompting) to satisfy the thirsting wanderers' demand calls to mind Christ's promise "Whosoever drinks of me...will never...thirst at all."

Exodus 3:2 And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.

Exodus 14:21-22 And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea; and the Lord caused the sea to go back by a strong east wind all that night, and made the sea dry land, and the waters were divided. And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea upon the dry ground: and the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand, and on their left.

Exodus 19:16 And it came to pass...that there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud upon the mount.

Exodus 19:18 And Mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire: and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly.

Donna Swanson Taylor, formerly of Detroit won our national competition held in 1975 for the design of the 36 clerestory windows. She will assist in their construction at the J. & R. Lamb Studios in New Jersey, the company selected to execute and install the windows. Taylor is an accomplished musician as well as a professional artist and teacher.

The MSGC is a constantly evolving database. Not all the data that has been collected by volunteers has been sorted and entered. Not every building has been completely documented.

All images in the Index are either born-digital photographs of windows or buildings or are scans of slides, prints, or other published sources. These images have been provided by volunteers and the quality of the material varies widely.

If you have any questions, additions or corrections, or think you can provide better images and are willing to share them, please contact donald20@msu.edu