“When we created the design of the church, there was a desire to make this new church representative of Holy Trinity Parish and as many of the churches that made up the parish,” she said. ”We used to have 12 in the county, and now we have five sites left.”

As it turned out, the glass from Sacred Heart was the best match for the new design, she said.

“When we developed the design, we wondered if we would we have any windows that would work,” Touney said. “The ones that ended up working best in the new church would come out of Sacred Heart.”

Reinarts Stained Glass Studios, of Winona, Minnesota, began the process of removing 16 clerestory windows earlier this week.

-Messenger photo by Hans Madsen
Seth Hoff, with Reinarts Stained Glass, of Winona, Minnesota, watches as Jamie Purcell works on labeling sections of the rose shaped stained glass window at Sacred Heart Catholic Church. Some of the windows are being removed and will be installed in the new Holy Trinity Catholic Church currently under construction.

The crew is also removing a large rose window from the church at 211 S. 13th St.

Workers from Reinarts will take the windows to their shop, restore them, and eventually bring them back for installation in the new church.

The workers are removing the trim around each section to pull each section out intact.

Diagrams of the windows have been drawn. Each window is marked with numbering to be kept in the right order.

The windows contain clear glass in addition to the stained glass, so once the stained glass is removed, glass remains in the window.

-Messenger photo by Hans Madsen
Seth Hoff, with Reinarts Stained Glass, of Winona, Minnesota, maps out the sections of the rose shaped stained glass window at Sacred Heart Catholic Church. Some of the windows are being removed and will be installed in the new Holy Trinity Catholic Church currently under construction.

On Wednesday, crews began removing the sections.

The large rose window contains colors that will complement the new church, Touney said.

“It has blues and greens, which are prominent with rose tones that come out in that,” she said. “Definitely the blues and greens will complement inside of new church.”

The rose window will be positioned on the east wall in the new church being built at Sixth Avenue North and Martin Luther King Drive.

“Parishioners will be able to see it,” Touney said. “It will have a very prominent place.”

The rose window has 12 sections to it.

“That’s a symbol we have used in the past is the rosette to represent the original parishes in the county,” Touney said. “Coming out of Sacred Heart, it pulls itself together and has great meaning.”

Pew ends from Sacred Heart that have the Trinitarian symbol imprinted on them will also be used in the new church.

The new church will be ADA accessible. It will not have steps.

The opening is anticipated for late spring or June 2020.