ARCHITECTURAL PLANS AND THEOLOGY OF THE SANCTUARY OF THE DIVINE MERCY

The Sanctuary of The Divine Mercy is now in its final planning stages. The Sanctuary grows from the vision of Fr. Anthony Bus, the pastor of St. Stanislaus Kostka Parish in Chicago, who tells the story of the sanctuary in his book A Mother's Plea. The project's architect, James McCrery of Washington, DC, a specialist in classical architecture.

The Sanctuary of The Divine Mercy starts with the premise that liturgical art and architecture are sacramental and therefore reveals to our senses the otherwise invisible realities of heaven through sign and symbol (Sacrosanctum Concilium, 122). As such, every architectural choice is a theological choice. The architecture of the Sanctuary is more than an architectural tent to keep out rain and wind. It is a three-dimensional building which makes present the very reality of The Divine Mercy in the same way that an icon is a two dimensional vehicle for making present the presence of a heavenly being. The primary theological motif of the Sanctuary of The Divine Mercy is the history of salvation as evidenced in the Garden of Eden, the Temple of Solomon, the Church, and the heavenly Jerusalem. Pilgrims to the Sanctuary will be welcomed into an oasis of prayer in the city, but also encounter in microcosmic form the great deeds of God in salvation history as well as an anticipated eschatology of their heavenly future. All the while, the greatness of God’s Mercy is shown as the means for returning to the embrace of the Father.

The large narrative of salvation history follows a fairly simple timeline: God was complete and perfect in Himself; he chose to create the world and human beings who were happy with Him in the Garden of Eden; humanity chose to reject God at the Fall and was ejected from the Garden; at the Fall, chaos and disorder entered the world; man’s relationship with God, with other human beings, and with nature was no longer in harmony and balance. God’s merciful plan of salvation, then, centers on drawing humanity back by re-ordering it toward right relationship with Him. In the Old Testament, this included the Ten Commandments as a merciful revelation of how God wanted his creatures to return to Him. The Sanctuary of The Divine Mercy is informed by this history in order to represent an "undoing" of the Fall in art and architecture.

According to Scripture and contemporary documentary evidence, the Temple of Solomon was not simply a large building for ritual activities. It was understood to be an evocation and making present of the reunification of God and humanity. It was composed of three portions, a porch, a large inner room, and a smaller cubic room at the rear.

The design of the Sanctuary of The Divine Mercy begins with this three-fold temple typology. Between the sidewalk and the garden courtyard with a transitional porch, using columns of brown stone to suggest the great bronze columns of the temple porch. Passing through the porch, the visitor will enter an enclosed courtyard garden, intended to be an oasis of order, peace, and beauty in the noise and chaos of the city. This garden corresponds to the hekal of the temple. With its ordered plantings, fragrant flowers, and fountain at the center which signifies the rivers of paradise, this garden will begin to "undo" the Fall in that it replaces city noise with peace, chaos with order, and engine fumes with sweet fragrance.

The architectural and theological destination of the Sanctuary, however, is the large interior adoration sanctuary at the east end which corresponds to the Holy of Holies in the Temple. As in the Temple of Solomon, the interior sanctuary will be an evocation of heaven. Whereas the Holy of Holies in the temple contained the ark of the Old Covenant of the Law, the Sanctuary will show this reality fulfilled. A rectangular pedestal recalling the Ark of the Covenant will become a setting for the "Iconic Monstrance", an image of the Virgin Mary which contains within it the Eucharist for adoration. Here, Christ, who is the New Covenant, is set within the womb of His Mother who is the new Ark. Therefore, representationally, the New Covenant literally stands on the Old Covenant, not abolishing it but fulfilling it.

The goal of this building is to draw people to The Divine Mercy. The beauty of the building and its art will not become an aesthetic end in itself, but be transparent to the formative and transformative presence of Christ. The hope is that people will be attracted by its beauty, engaged in the truth of its content, and transformed by the goodness they find in Christ. They will then go forth to transform the world, making disciples of all nations as they preach the revelation of The Divine Mercy.

Excerpt from the Theology of the Sanctuary by Dr. Denis McNamara

Examples of the firm's architectural style can be seen at A Million Souls Building Sanctuary.