Loyola University of Los Angeles - Lair Yearbook (Los Angeles, CA)

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Spf The student body of the University has long desired to erect a fitting monument on the campus to the Mother of God. In the Fall of i949 the Associated Students started a cam- paign to organize and direct interest in the construction project and to finance the building of the shrine. The impetus for the movement lies in a twofold urge dear to the heart of every Loyolan. The shrine would be the result of and an expression of the indi- vidual man's love for Our Blessed Lady and a demonstration of the wish of the collective student group to channel their prayer and work through her to Almghty God. The Loyola Man who possesses a deep affection for his University also wants to leave something behind him to mark his stay as well as to carry away for the future what the school has givenfhim. The shrine will fill that desire too, remaining as a part of the tradtion of the Del Rey campus. Since the shrine is the material expres- soin of a spiritual devotion on the part of the students themselves, it is fitting that the task of financing the construction should fall to them alone. By a series of collections and subscriptions among the students the amounts necessary forthe continuation of the labor was raised. SHRINE Having arranged for the necessary funds, the students themselves began the work on the actual building of the shrine. Groups of students cleared away the pile of rocks on which the old Spanish crucifix had stood and prepared the ground for the fin- ished edifice. Student-sculptor Gilbert Amelio com- menced the long, painstaking task of hew- ing the image of the Blessed'Virgin from the huge block of Indiana limestone. . . a labor that will take close to two yea rs of continued and concentrated work. When the shrine is completed and the work done, there will be a symbol standing on the campus to remind all generations of future Loyola Men that those who preceded them on the Hill cherished the ideals of Loyola and had the ardent wish that those ideals might be perpetuated. Austatue of Our Lady, Mother of God and Seat of Wis- dom, enshrined on our campus as she is in our hearts will be an enduring symbol of the meaning of Catholic education . . . a system that believes in training the whole man, body, mind and spirit and not merely a part of him.

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