Courtney McGrailDear Editor, In his most interesting letter regarding the face of Our Lady of Knock sculpted by the renowned Italian sculptor Professor Lorenzo Ferri (IC 03/09/2015), Msgr Denis O’Callaghan correctly observes that the professor “was inspired to read the image of the Mother of Jesus as a reflection of that of her Son on the Shroud of Turin”.
Of greater interest, though, is the fact that the same image was rejected by Dame Judy Coyne, foundress of the Handmaids of Knock, who had been sent to Rome by the Archbishop of Tuam to ensure that the professor’s work corresponded with what the witnesses of the apparition had actually seen.
“I was not satisfied with the expression on Our Lady’s face, despite the fact that her features, which had been copied from… the shroud, were beautiful,” she later wrote in her book, Providence My Guide. After several more “failed” attempts, the professor exclaimed to Judy, “Madame wants the divine. I can only give her the human”. The impasse was resolved after a visit by Mrs Coyne to a Mass being said by Saint Padre Pio at San Giovanni in the month of November.
During that Mass the professor was inspired to rise from his sickbed and complete in three hours the grace-filled expression on the face of Our Lady of Knock that Dame Judy Coyne believed was closest to that described by the apparition witnesses, and which we now see in Knock Shrine today.
Lumen Gentium says that “the motherhood of Mary in the order of grace continues without interruption since the Annunciation”. (LG62)
May Judy’s prayers help us all to find at Knock that grace which enhances our humanity.
Yours etc.,
Fr Freddy Warner SMA,
Portumna,
Co. Galway.