A Painter of Saints
McNichols presents the icon of Our Lady of the New Advent
to Pope John Paul II, as a remembrance of World Youth Day,
August 11-15, 1993 in Denver. The work was commissioned
by Archbishop Francis Stafford of Denver
Father William Hart McNichols does the work and prayer of iconography in the high desert of New Mexico, at Rancho de Taos, where he also assists with sacramental ministry at the parish of San Francsco de Asis. "In the winter, it gets dark at four in the evening here," he says. "I can work quietly from late in the afternoon until midnight." His dedication, and the relative isolation of his surroundings, has made this a productive time for him.
Two collections of his icons were published last year. The Bride: Images of the Church, with text by Daniel Berringan, and Mary, Mother of All Nations, with text by Megan McKenna, have both received the Catholic Book Award.
The Bride derives its title from a traditional image of the Church in relationship to God, as that of wife to husband - with all its implied intimacy, commitment, and love. "This book contains many faces of Christ himself, faces that peer out at us seeking to express characteristics of Christ in history, in the church, in old and contemporary saints, and in nontraditional holy people, Megan McKenna writes in her introduction. Padre Pio, the Italian mystic and priest with the gift of the stigmata, and Jerzy Popieluszko, priest and friend Pope John Paul II, who was abducted and killed by the Polish secret police in 1984, are two of the modern figures featured among the twenty-seven icons.
Mary, Mother of All Nations depicts images of Mary in thirty-one icons, including the Black Madonna, Our Lady of Sorrows, Mother of the Incarnate Word, and Our Lady of the Apocalypse.
McNichols was nineteen when he entered the Society of Jesus in 1968. He was ordained a priest in 1979. "I've done 110 icons so far," he notes, "and it is a wonder to me that God would give me all these icons to a Jesuit, a group not known in recent times to be visually oriented."
In 1999 he was commissioned to paint an image of St. Francis for the church of San Francisco de Asis, in Rancho de Taos. He found it a particularly nurturing place to do his work, and he has since made it his home. "In this neck of the woods I am referred to as a santero - a painter of saints - a common occupation around here. I don't have to explain to anybody what I do, they already know.
- Robert Burns
Fr. McNichols presenting the Pope the Our Lady of the New Advent Icon
World Youth Day, August 14, 1993
Our Lady of the New Advent
- Icons by Fr. William McNichols
- Information about Fr. William McNichols and his Icons
This page is managed by
Fr. Raymond A. Bucko, S.J.
of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology
at Creighton University.E-Mail: bucko@creighton.edu
Page Last Updated: November 16, 2002
