St. Patrick’s Cathedral

New York’s great Catholic cathedral, built with the money of poor immigrants

Local name: St. Patrick's Cathedral

Collection: New York · USA · Open in OpenStreetMap

The cathedral’s marble spires among the towers of Fifth Avenue · Shelbytyre, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons

The story

Before you is St. Patrick’s Cathedral, the main Catholic church of New York. It was the idea of John Hughes, the first archbishop of New York. In 1853 he announced that the city needed a cathedral worthy of its growing congregation. The site was far beyond the city of the day, almost in the wilderness, and people laughed at the plan, calling it Hughes’ Folly. But the archbishop believed that one day this would be the heart of the city. The architect James Renwick designed it, with walls of white marble. The cornerstone was laid on the fifteenth of August 1858. The Civil War halted construction: there were neither workers nor money. The cathedral was built with donations from thousands of poor immigrants, and one hundred and three wealthy citizens gave a thousand dollars each. On the twenty-fifth of May 1879 the cathedral opened, though it still had no spires. They were finished in 1888, and the towers rise 330 feet. Inside, the church is 306 feet long, and the vaults rise 108 feet. In 1906 the Lady Chapel was added on the Madison Avenue side. The church was consecrated only on the fifth of October 1910, once it had paid off all its debts. On the sixteenth of September 2001 a Mass was held here for the victims of the attacks of September eleventh. And on the nineteenth of April 2008, Benedict the Sixteenth became the first pope to celebrate Mass in this cathedral.

Visiting

Fifth Avenue between 50th and 51st Streets. The cathedral is open daily from 6:45 a.m. to 8:45 p.m. No tickets are needed for Mass, except for a few holiday services. Security checks bags, and luggage cannot be left. No food or drinks except water; men should remove their hats; phone calls are not allowed. The wheelchair ramp is on 51st Street. Tours are paid and booked on the cathedral’s website.