There’s no question that Brother Charles Joyce has made his mark.
Just ask the Seibt family of Tinley Park. Or the Swiecickis of Evergreen Park. Or the Klonowskis of Chicago.
Given his calling, you might think that Joyce’s impact on these families is moral or spiritual. That may be true, but those families also admire his craftsmanship.
Joyce designs stained glass objects and has crafted more than 500 of them. His glasswork also includes Nativity scenes, flowers, angels and animals.
“I put the angel in my window at Christmas, and I haven’t taken it down,” said Jean Swiecicki. “It’s a big attention-getter. My neighbors are very impressed.”
Joyce, 59, has been working in stained glass since 1984, when he was operated on and needed a hobby to fill his recuperation time. He doesn’t do this for personal gain, since profits are turned over to the Congregation of Christian Brothers, to which Joyce has belonged since 1953.
Brother Rice High School in Chicago, where he is an electrician-plumber-carpenter-landscaper, is Joyce’s gallery. Visitors to the Southwest Side school are greeted by his glass angel hanging from the front door. The window between the school and courtyard is home to 10 of his works, filled with small angels and flowers. At Christmas, the school also displays one of Joyce’s Nativity scenes.
The school’s main office holds seven more of his pieces. But it is in the chapel that Joyce’s contributions are most evident. Two multicolored windows each measure 30 by 6 1/2 feet.
The window on the left is called “Growth,” an abstract design of a person reaching out to God in the blue sky. The window on the right has long, vertical orange pieces of glass bordered by pieces in various shades of blue. Called “Journey,” it portrays a road and represents the journey through life.
In all, the school displays about 30 of Joyce’s works. His talent is appreciated by visitors to the school and those who are knowledgeable about glass craftsmanship.
Mike Prokop owns Southwest Stained Glass in Oak Lawn and designs and makes stained glass for churches, homes and businesses he also sells Joyce most of his glass. Prokop is particularly impressed by “Growth.”
“The colorings were good, and I liked the design,” said Prokop, who added that a professional would charge about $6,000 for that window.
Joyce was educated at St. Sabina Grammar School and Leo High School in Chicago.
Joyce joined the Congregation of Christian Brothers when he was just 18. Being a brother meant making a commitment to poverty, chastity and obedience. It also meant a commitment to teaching.
“I thought I could do some good by teaching at a Catholic school,” he said. So he did just that, at schools in New York, Seattle, Birmingham, Mich., as well as two lengthy stints at Brother Rice in Chicago, the first from 1961-76.
Throughout the ’70s he was plagued by pain in his knees, and by 1984 the pain became so intense he required surgery. An operation on his legs left him in a casts for six months.
During his recuperation in Birmingham, a friend suggested that he try working with stained glass. Soon, he was making windows for the Birmingham chapel and teaching those skills to high school students there.
In 1986, he returned to Brother Rice in Chicago. Throughout his teaching years, Joyce had always enjoyed taking care of the physical needs of the schools he worked at. Today, Joyce devotes his time to Brother Rice’s grass, lighting, and mechanical needs. For two hours in the afternoon and another two hours in the evening, he goes into a 10-by-30-foot studio and works at his craft.
“You can’t cut glass unless you’re in the right frame of mind,” Joyce said. “You have to be cool, calm and relaxed.”
In his studio, Joyce first lays out a design for his final product on a large piece of paper. “It’s like working with a puzzle,” he said.
Joyce is proud of his creations and eager to show visitors his photo book, a collection of all the glasswork he has ever done. Some of his work is on display in Catholic chapels in Peru. In Seattle and Birmingham and Grand Beach, Mich., several homes display his work.
But it’s in the Chicago area where his impact is the greatest. Michael and Sandy Minervini’s home in Hometown includes an angel, a gift from Brother Joyce to Sandy for her service as an officer in the Brother Rice Mothers Club. For Catherine Seibt of Tinley Park, Joyce converted the doors of a wood cabinet to glass. “He’s truly a craftsman,” she said.
Although Joyce’s work often has a liturgical theme, many clients are not necessarily looking for a religious stamp on their home.
“People are looking for aesthetics,” Joyce said. About one-third of his clients are paying customers who often come to him after hearing of his work from someone who has been to Brother Rice or to a home where his work is displayed. It costs between $45 and $55 per square foot to “hire” Joyce, but he explained that it takes four hours just to work on one square foot of glass. All of the profits go into equipment and materials or are given to Brother Rice.
Working with glass is not the only thing that fills his time. Brother Michael Segvich, Brother Rice principal,recalls Joyce getting up at 4:30 a.m. to plow snow so Brother Rice could hold classes. Others spoke of his care for the 15 or so ducks that visit Brother Rice’s courtyard every spring.
“He’s an upbeat type of person,” said Brother Greg O’Donnell, who does public relations work for the Congregation of Christian Brothers and lives at Brother Rice High. “He’s got a real antenna for someone who needs a hand.”
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To contact Joyce, call Brother Rice High School at 312-779-3410.
