Article by phoenix writer Brooke Oldenborg ’26
St. Francis looked at the prospective Marianist brothers and smiled; next to him, St. Bernard watched with pleasure. It’s 1953 and a number of young men are beginning to live out the spiritual life of the Marianist brothers in the chapel. It’s a cold day up in Marcy, New York, but the foundation of the novitiate building, built by the Marianists in the 1940s, is a strong one.
Decades of faith-filled training and community continued, until the novitiate was sold to a Baptist community in the ‘70s. Francis and Bernard remained within the dwelling, even upon the selling of the former novitiate from the Baptists to a developer 30 years later at the turn of the century.
This developer, whom Kellenberg came in contact with in the early 2000s, turned out to be a devout Catholic. His plan was to transform the novitiate building into multiple condominiums, and thus had no use for the luminous windows of stained glass. These, of course, are where the beloved Francis and Bernard resided—their impeccable features made known through colorful and delicate glass, carefully crafted to capture the essence of warmth and comfort in the eyes of a saint.
The procession of nearly 20 stained glass saints in the chapel of the novitiate was no longer needed. Soon, they would be destroyed. But the developer had a dream; in it, his late wife told him to give the stained glass windows to the Kellenberg brothers, free of charge.
He did just that.
It wasn’t long before a group of brothers and students alike made the four hour trip upstate. The day was nothing short of cold, but that didn’t stop the determined Firebirds—nothing did.
St. Francis and St. Bernard, the beloved neighbors on the walls of the former novitiate chapel, were leaving the only home they’d ever known. Placed gently and strategically on multiple buses, the windows began the journey to their new home.
Upon arrival at Kellenberg Memorial, Francis and Bernard were fit properly into their new residence, where they would be adored by hundreds of students each and every day. This location, of course, is the St. Carlo Acutis Technology Center—the hub for advanced learning and activity life at Kellenberg.
While not as remarkable of a story, the stained glass located in the Maria Regina Room of the Firebird Center for Arts and Athletics were also purchased in a manner of preservation. Bro. Timothy Driscoll, S.M., now Vice President for Mission and Rector Designate at University of Dayton, had been a Marianist brother at Kellenberg and Chaminade for many decades. As an art teacher at Kellenberg and Chaminade, Bro. Tim was always involved in beautifying the school campus. Looking for stained glass for the FCAA, Bro. Tim utilized a website to buy windows formerly belonging to a Catholic Church.
The site is called the Sacred Windows Rescue Project, which highlights windows from churches that have been either closed or renovated.
When designing the Maria Regina room, the center for apostolic activities in the FCAA, the brothers sought to feature stained glass to bring light and vivid color to the formerly long and windowless wall.
The set purchased was one of twelve panels, which featured Marian titles from the Litany of Loretta. They came from a church in the diocese of Allentown, Pennsylvania, where they were first introduced in the mid 20th-century.
The panels were soon fit into light boxes and placed where hundreds of students adore them each day.
They may not be inspiring future Marianist brothers on the daily as in the novitiate chapel, but the canonized Francis and Bernard are looking down proudly on their windowed replicas making Kellenberg the home of faith that it is today.
