The Pilgrims Page: St. Mary’s and St. Mark’s in Peoria, Illinois

The next stop on our pilgrimage through the Midwest is the city of Peoria, Illinois. It is here that the renowned Bishop Fulton Sheen grew up and was ordained a priest in 1919 at St. Mary’s Cathedral. He was named an auxiliary bishop for the Archdiocese of New York in 1951 and in 1961 was Bishop of Rochester. 

What made Bishop Sheen so popular was a prime-time TV show called, “Life is Worth Living” which aired from 1952–1957. He won an Emmy and was featured on the cover of Time Magazine for preaching the Gospel to millions of Americans with his crafty wit and inspiring words that seemed to flow out of his mouth like poetry. He wrote 66 books and was both a great philosopher and theologian. He passed away in 1979 and the cause for his canonization opened in 2002. He is now officially called Venerable. There is an approved miracle for his Beatification, so we shall wait and see.

Bishop Sheen is buried in the same church where he was ordained to the priesthood, the Cathedral of St. Mary in Peoria. You can visit and pray right in front of his tomb which has an image of Our Mother of Perpetual Help above it. The Cathedral of St. Mary is a church which will leave you marveling at the beautiful gold and blue interior colors and the deep blue rose window. While you are there, be sure to visit the St. Thomas More chapel off to the side which houses many relics of saints. Down the street from the Cathedral is the Archbishop Fulton Sheen Museum where you can learn about his life and see many of his personal belongings along with the crucifix from his TV stage show.  

We continue on the “to be saints” trail in Peoria and stop at St. Mark’s Church on the campus of Bradley University. This unique church has replicas of the famous frescos by Blessed Fra Angelico. Fra Angelico was a Dominican friar who lived and painted during the early 1400s in Italy. St. Mark’s Church was named a shrine to Blessed Fra Angelico in 2004. It was Father Benjamin Reese who visited the church in Rome where Fra Angelico is buried where he had the inspiration to reproduce the frescos for St. Mark’s Church. The original artwork by Fra Angelica you can see in some churches in Italy and various art museums around the world. However, at this church the reproductions are slightly different. Just as Fra Angelico used the faces of people he knew for his art, so does this new rendition. It is hard to notice any real difference at first, but there are a few familiar faces to the congregation depicted in the background scenes. Artists Andrew Hatermann and Robert and Greta Hill were tasked for this job and were able to incorporate former pastors into the work along with a long-time parishioner. This makes these pieces a little more personal to the parishioners who worship here and helps draw them into scenes from the lives of Jesus and Mary.