The University of Guadalajara awarded on November 9 the Doctorate Honoris Causa to Fray Gabriel Chávez de la Mora OSB, architect 92 years old, who is the first graduate of that career in that house of studies.
According to information from the Archdiocese of Guadalajara, Fray Gabriel finished his speech of thanks for receiving the Honoris Causa doctorate, which his alma mater gave him with a phrase that combines the motto of the University of Guadalajara and the maxim of Saint Benedict: Pray, think and work‘,
During the ceremony, the rector of the University Center for Art, Architecture and Design of the University of Guadalajara (CUAAD), Dr. Francisco Javier González, recognized the trajectory of fray Gabriel, first architect graduated from the University of Guadalajara.
“In our spaces, long-standing professionals with close ties to the institution that has trained them are trained, and the conviction that we are a diverse and secular house of studies that respects the most diverse creeds“said the rector.
75 years of trajectory
In this framework, Dr. Ricardo Villanueva LomeliRector General of the University of Guadalajara, stated: “we met to grant the Doctor Honoris Causa to the friar and architect Gabriel Chávez de la Mora, for his contributions to architecture, design, crafts, graphic and sculptural arts; and as the rector of CUAAD said, to the poetry of all through all of these”.
Chávez de la Mora’s work does not subscribe solely to architecture, but rather created a new religious iconography from incorporating into their works materials such as wood, silver foil, screen printing, wire rod and the development of furniture and equipment with a liturgical orientation.
The religious worked to put art at the service of evangelization and religion in the adaptation and creation of hundreds of chapels, temples and cathedrals, in addition to the design of elements such as crosses and altarpieces, Villanueva said.
The ceremony was attended by various personalities from the civil and religious spheres, such as the priests Dr. Javier Magdaleno CuevaChancellor Secretary of the Archdiocese of Guadalajara and Engineer Architect Eduardo Gomez Becerraof the Sacred Art Commission, among others.
During the ceremony, a video with the profile of Fray Gabriel was projected, in which emphasis was placed on his work throughout these almost 75 years of experience. At the beginning of his work, in 1957 the creation for his religious community of a “beautiful and revolutionary” circular chapel made of stone, wood and brick stands out, which, unlike the traditional “Latin cross” plants, he proposed a community gathered around the altar as in a fraternal dinner.
“To get closer to God and not just to us”
the line of d“Christocentric” design, started in the 1920s in Europe, had in Ahuacatitlán (Morelos state) his first Mexican performance. It is the first in Mexico and perhaps in Latin America, designed so that the priest celebrated Mass in front of the faithful, even before the Second Vatican Council allowed it.
Among the attendees was also the parchitect Alberto Ruízmember of the Sacred Art Commission, who has known Fray Gabriel for many years, and who has defined him as a great friend and brother.
They met when Father Alberto entered the University of Guadalajara, to study Architecture, where he had his first meeting with Monsignor Rafael Uribe, today of happy memory, who also led him to collaborate with fray Gabriel Chávez de la Mora in the project of the Sanctuary of Santo Toribio Romoland of this holy martyr, near Jalostotilán, Jalisco.
The priest architect Alberto Ruíz shared: “on one occasion, he commented to me: ‘this is a school of art, of spirituality, and we have to project it in the designs we are makingbecause the work we do serves to get closer to God and not only to us, but to our brothers who will be in that space’”.
Among the architectural works that Fray Gabriel has directed as an architect, the following stand out: the Basilica of Guadalupe, in Mexico City; the Cathedral of Cuernavaca (Mexico); the Benedictine Monastery of Tepeyac on Lake Guadalupe (Mexico); the Ecumenical Chapel of Peace in Acapulco (Mexico); the Chapel of the Benedictine Priory of Tibatí (Colombia); the Parish of Santiago (Guatemala) and the Chapel of the Benedictine Abbey of La Pierre Qui Vire (France).
Photo: University of Guadalajara