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The Blessed Seelos shrine is nicely done, although, like a lot of smaller Catholic shrines I’ve visited, you sort of have to work at seeing it and would be well-advised to study up on when and where and how before you attempt it. The Center itself, a building beside the church, is locked, and you must ring the bell to be let in. Then there’s a room to the left, the doors to which are also normally closed (although not locked) and the lights off, which contains the exhibit about Fr. Seelos’ life.   As I mentioned, the church itself isn’t open except during Mass, but the shrine at the rear of the church containing Blessed Seelos’ remains (disinterred from his first casket and reinterred in a church-shaped reliquary containing what is left of his body “in a baby’s casket” (the words of the guide) – except for his breastbone, which is displayed in a reliquary to the side.

Do read about Fr. Seelos, a Redemptorist beatified in 2000 who, among other things was a tireless missionary, compassionate pastor and lived for a time with St. John Neumann in Pittsburgh. I was interested in the list of missions he gave around the Northeast and Midwest (it reminded me of a recent read – a biography of Blessed Andre Bessette recently reissued by Ave Maria Press - which described in part Blessed Andre’s rather extensive travels in the United States, including to California!)

I didn’t much like this element of the exhibit room, though – you come around a corner in the small room and are presented with this life-sized re-enactment of Fr. Seelos’ death (from yellow fever – mosquitos (ibid)). It gave us a bit of a start, as they say.

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