Praying Hands

The target for this challenge was the largest bronze structure in the world, the sixty-foot high, 30 ton Praying Hands sculpture which is the centerpiece for the Avenue of Flags at the campus of Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Created by native Oklahoman sculptor Leonard McMurry, it was cast in Juarez, Mexico in 1980 and originally placed in front of the City of Faith, or what is now known as the Cityplex Towers complex, seen below in a southern facing view, adjacent to the campus. This complex, also built by Oral Roberts and sharing the rather bizarre and garish architectural themes of the university, was intended (per a 'message from God') to be a state-of-the-art cancer research and treatment center, but this never came to be and was eventually sold for office space, at which time the sculpture was moved to its current location at the entrance to the campus. Though the focus of the target was the sculpture itself, the location and southern Tulsa at large is conspicuously dominated by the 60 story scale of the main tower which can be seen for miles in any direction.