Beloved St. Agnes Statue Reinstalled in Time for Christmas

Posted

The statue of St. Agnes outside the rectory of the church at East 43rd Street in Manhattan is a familiar sight to parishioners—and commuters—who pass by on their way from Grand Central Station to their workplaces.

During the second week of November, the statue’s head was twisted and pulled off in a horrendous act of desecration. To hide the act, the 4-foot marble statue was draped with a black cloth until it was fixed and moved back into an elevated position Dec. 21.

“The people love their parish, love their patron. A lot of people took it personally that their patron was desecrated,” said Father Myles Murphy, who has served as pastor of St. Agnes since 2011.

Father Murphy told CNY that his parishioners began to reach out as soon as they heard the disturbing news about the beloved statue. “People came through with prayers and donations,” he said on the afternoon the restored statue was put back in place.

“They made phone calls and sent emails and visited to ask what they could do.”

When parishioners learned that the statue would be reinstalled in time for Christmas, they were ecstatic, said the pastor, who said the statue would be blessed on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day.

Legend says that St. Agnes was a young virgin who was martyred by beheading in the first half of the third century. Other attempts to shame and kill her failed. Her feast day is Jan. 21.

Maureen Flaherty, a parishioner since 1988, said, “I felt strongly that the statue would be restored because St. Agnes, in her own life, overcame so much for her Christianity.”

“When I thought of this sweet little statue, I knew she would come back, too,” she told CNY.

“Everyone entering that church will give a sigh of relief that our patron saint is restored. That is another reason to celebrate at Christmas.”

The newly restored and reinstalled statue, which gazes outward toward Lexington Avenue, is a familiar sight to commuters. “Dozens of pedestrians and visitors were making comments about how happy they are that the statue is being replaced,” Father Murphy said.

The church gets a lot of foot traffic from Grand Central Station. “Hundreds of people every day going to work or home from work, to a meeting or from a meeting, will be able to stop, if only for a minute, to ask our Lord for something through the intercession of his saint,” the pastor said.