(above) St Benedict the Moor in happier times.

St. Benedict the Moor
342 West 53rd Street.

One day in 2014, I stopped by the curious, unpretentious church of St Benedict the Moor. In several prior visits I had never gained access to the main church (weekday masses were held in the rectory chapel). But on this day, I found the church open and filled with a large congregation! The Blessed Sacrament was exposed in a monstrance upon the altar; the people were singing and praying the rosary. Someone mumbled to me something about a “parish festival.” I decided it was high time for me to come back on some Sunday when the church would be less crowded, take some pictures and write something about this time-honored legacy of past evangelical effort and sacrifice – the first church for blacks in the Northern states!

But when I returned – the following Sunday, I believe – the church was closed and locked the rectory of the Franciscans abandoned (the priests had moved to New Jersey), all religious services discontinued.

Had I actually attended the final celebration of the life of this parish?

St Benedict the Moor has an extraordinary history quite in contrast with its resolutely pedestrian un-Catholic appearance. For this parish was founded as a first mission to the blacks of the New York Archdiocese and beyond. It owes its origin to a bequest by Fr Thomas Farrell, the renowned rector of St Joseph (Greenwich Village – at that time most New York blacks lived in or around the Village). The equally well-known Fr. Richard L. Burtsell was the founder and first pastor in 1883. The first home of the new “mission church to the colored people”– a then out-of-fashion neoclassical temple – later served as the first church of Our Lady of Pompeii. St Benedict the Moor actually had no territorial boundaries but included all the black population of New York and even of the Newark and Brooklyn dioceses as well.

In 1898 the church we see today on West 53rd street was acquired from a German Protestant congregation. For by 1900 the center of gravity of the New York City black population had moved north to the West 50’s. We read, however, that in fact whites made up a large part of the congregation throughout this period – and provided much of the financing. The surroundings of the parish’s new home were indeed not stylish – in those days an elevated rail line ran down West 53rd street.

In its early years this mission generated an extraordinary amount of commentary – often hostile – from the New York and national press and the Protestant establishment. Was it not a nefarious plot to establish a papist fifth column in a new section of the population? Nor can we say that this mission met with understanding and enthusiasm among all quarters of the Catholic population. Yet through the 1930’s a handful of dedicated (Irish) priests dedicated themselves with heroic devotion to the mission of St Benedict the Moor: Fathers John F. Burke (the second pastor, who in 1907 became leader of the national Catholic mission to blacks in the United States), Thomas O’Keefe and Timothy Shanley. In the course of time an orphanage, a school (which St Katherine Drexel visited in 1924) and a convent of sisters were added to the parish.

(Above) This neoclassical temple was the original home of St Benedict’s parish – and later of Our Lady of Pompeii.

(Above) The festive liturgy for the Golden Jubilee of the parish, 1933.

In 1933 a grand Solemn Mass was the highlight of the parish’s fiftieth anniversary. Yet in a few short years difficulties came to a head. The blacks of New York, the target group of this mission, had for the last thirty years been relocating uptown once again – to Harlem. If whites worshipped at St Benedict’s, Catholic blacks could and did worship in their local territorial parishes, in Harlem or elsewhere. Finally, the relentless transformation of the immediate Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood into a heavily commercial zone hurt the local parishes, including St Benedict the Moor. By the late 1930’s it had been reduced to a chapel of the nearby parish of Sacred Heart, with only Sunday masses being offered.

But in those days Catholics did not so easily give up their consecrated churches, regardless of “demographic change.” Was there not an infinite number of evangelical works still to be accomplished? After the Second World War it was now the Spanish- speaking peoples – particularly the Puerto Ricans – who started to flock to New York. Cardinal Spellman’s advancement of the Spanish-speaking apostolate has been regrettably forgotten nowadays. Yet due to him, St Benedict the Moor was “repurposed” as a Spanish-speaking mission parish, in the care of the Third order Regular Franciscans. This too was commemorated by a splendid liturgy in February 1954. So, St Benedict the Moor’s mission of evangelization continued for many more decades. By the 1980’s, however, except for parishes mostly in the Yorkville/Upper East Side area, almost every parish on the island of Manhattan had a large “Hispanic” population.

The rededication of the parish to the Hispanic apostolate in 1954.(Above)Cardinal Spellman in procession. (Below) The liturgy celebrated on this occasion – which was also reported in the New York Times among other places.

(Above) Mass with Cardinal O’Connor in 1984.

(Above) The new rectory was dedicated in 1967 – it stretched the resources of this small parish.

The layout of the church of St Benedict the Moor, built in 1869 as a severely Protestant hall, would strike most as unusual for a Catholic parish. Upon entering, the visitor encountered downstairs a large bookstore. To get to the actual church one had to ascend a staircase. The church regrettably was locked on weekdays – a not infrequent phenomenon in Manhattan. The visitor could get only a glimpse through glass doors of a simple, obscurely lit interior adorned with some statues and stained-glass windows (the decor of the sanctuary apparently dates from a 1950’s restoration).

(Above) The interior of the church – reached by a flight of stairs. (Below) Part of a large window or Our Lady of Guadalupe added in this parish’s “Hispanic” era.

(Above and below) The forlorn church of St Benedict the Moor as seen in more recent months.

St Benedict the Moor made its way on to Cardinal Egan’s hit list in 2007. Yet the outcry was such that Cardinal had to back down. It is eloquent testimony to the accelerating decline of Roman Catholic sensibility in New York that in 2014 St Benedict could be shuttered summarily – even outside of the normal “Making all Things New” process – with nary a peep from anyone. St Benedict’s has now (2017) been made available for sale or other uses; some (secular) opposition to the loss of the church is now stirring in the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood.

St Benedict, while it still stands, testifies to earlier generations that acknowledged and took up the burden of evangelization in this gigantic metropolis. Like so many other seemingly minor New York parishes, in its heyday it attracted citywide and even national attention with a mission that extended far beyond the parish’s immediate neighborhood. But the significance of the summary closure of this church is not just the tragic loss of an inheritance of the past. It’s a most eloquent symbol of the extinction of the spirit of Catholic mission in the New York Archdiocese.

(Above) Behind an iron grate the relic of a former devotion.

(Above) The statue of Our Lady, located in a niche obove the rectory door, has been removed.

See generally, Coll, Fr. George, A Pioneer Church (1993); O’Brian, Michael J., St Benedict the Moor: Mission Church of the Colored People (1933)

Stained glass window in the Church of St. Jean Baptiste, New York

by Fr. Richard Cipolla (from the bulletin of St. Mary Church, Norwalk)

One of the recent “movements” is the Slow Food Movement. This began as a protest against “fast food”. This protest is not merely against fast food on culinary grounds but also against the whole notion of eating on the run, eating fast. Slow Food takes food seriously and in a sense religiously, recalling, at least for a Catholic, the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand, and ultimately the Eucharist as the food from heaven. The Eucharist is Slow Food, for how can one not savour that Food that carries within it the Eternity of God Himself.

The Manna from Heaven as the ultimate Slow Food demands that its preparation reflect the eternity that is contained in the Blessed Sacrament. You may have noticed that when I celebrate Holy Mass, whether in the Ordinary or Extraordinary Form, I have slowed things down. I have spoken to the Sacred Ministers about this as well as the servers. There is to be no rushing at the altar. Every movement, every gesture within the Mass must reflect the Eternal that lies at the heart of the celebration of Mass. This does not mean an artificial slow motion. It means that the Mass must always be celebrated with the quiet dignity and composure that is redolent of the worship of God in heaven.

One of the reasons for the invention of the Novus Ordo Mass was the often sloppy and even more often the mechanical rapidity of the saying of the text of the Traditional Mass by so many priests. The celebration of Mass should never be robotic nor perfunctorily objective. To celebrate Mass in that way is to deny the Mystery that lies at its very heart. Of course, there is an objectivity that must be preserved in the Mass. One enters into” What is already there”. One does not “make” it by attempts to give meaning to the words by a sentimental and personal reading of the words. But that objectivity also demands the subjective appropriation of the Sacrifice itself by the priest who celebrates Mass. And this is true of the deacon, the sub-deacon and the servers at Solemn Mass, as well as those who participate in the Novus Ordo Mass like the lectors and servers. All who serve in any capacity at the Mass must always be aware that they are entering the Holy of Holies that is the Mass and therefore they must reflect in their service the mystery and beauty of the Mass. The Mass is never something “to get through”. It is something that one enters into and must conform to its quiet dignity and holiness. And, of course, all of this applies to those assist at the Mass in the congregation. They must never be spectators but full participants in mind, body and soul in the worship of the Mass that is the icon of worship in heaven.

Drop thy still dews of quietness,
till all our strivings cease;
take from our souls the strain and stress,
and let our ordered lives confess
the beauty of thy peace.

Breathe through the heats of our desire
thy coolness and thy balm;
let sense be dumb, let flesh retire;
speak through the earthquake, wind, and fire,
O still, small voice of calm!

St. Pius X Church in Fairfield, CT, will offer a Solemn Mass for the Feast of Corpus Christi on Thursday, May 31 at 7 pm. A procession in the church and benediction will follow the Mass. Fr. Timothy Iannacone will be the celebrant, with Fr. Michael Novajosky as deacon and Fr. Donal Kloster as subdeacon. The pastor of St. Pius X, Fr. Samuel Kachuba, will give the sermon.

The first annual Lepanto Conference will be hosted by the Basilica of the Immaculate Conception in Waterbury, Connecticut, where several hundred Catholic high schoolers, college students, and young professionals from all over the East Coast are expected to attend.A Solemn High Mass in the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite will be celebrated upstairs in the basilica. Lunch will follow the Mass, where attendees will have the opportunity to meet other young Catholics.
For further information, contact Bradley Morley, bradleymorley4@gmail.com

(Above) The immense church of Our Lady Queen of Peace. On a Friday afternoon the peace of this church is only disturbed by 3-4 worshippers. (The photograph exaggerates the brightness of the interior)

Amsterdam, like Vienna, gives us a real sense of the end of European and Christian civilization. It’s no accident that Camus’ The Fall was set here. Homosexuality, cannabis, whores in display windows and relentless business activity dominate the “public square”- while a handful of believers huddles here and there amid the chaos.

It was not always so. In a once working class but currently trendy neighborhood “De Pijp” we find a grand Catholic church built in the 1920’s: “Our Lady Queen of Peace.” I read that so many Catholic families were moving into this area in the 1920’s – assisted by Catholic organizations – that it became known as “Popeville” (Papendorp). “Queen of Peace” – I’m told that was a popular appellation for Catholic Churches at that time – after the First World War – in the Netherlands

Those days are long gone. The once exemplary Catholic Church of the Netherlands was one of the earliest casualties of Vatican II (the “Dutch Catechism!”) Today, as one source specifically notes, there are no more large Catholic families living in the neighborhood of Our Lady Queen of Peace. But some souls still come to this church to worship amid the silence and the darkness…

The architecture – in a typical local style of the 1920’s – reminds the New York visitor of St Catherine of Siena church in Manhattan.

(Above and below) The chapel of Our Lady – with an image in a style that should appeal to fans of the “other modern” as promoted in the New Liturgical Movement a few years ago. Judging from the candles lit before this image there still exists some kind of active devotion here.

(Above and below) This church has an unusual – at least to me – set of stained glass windows illustrating the litany of Loretto. Not all are in as good condition as these.

(Above) Three women and (I assume) a priest singing vespers early Friday evening, concluding with the “Regina Caeli” (in Latin) sung before the chapel of Our Lady).

Last Monday Professor Roberto de Mattei addressed issues of the papacy in a lecture at St. Mary’s church. Prof. de Mattei carefully laid out the theological basis of the papacy and pointed out how the lack of understanding of this framework has led to the crisis of papal government we are facing today. The text of Professor de Mattei’s address can be found HERE on the Rorate Caeli blog. Afterwards discussions continued at a lively reception. The lecture and reception were preceded by a beautiful solemn mass which included rare orchestral sacred music of the Mexican baroque as well as works by Monteverdi and others.

We at the Society of St Hugh of Cluny are grateful for Prof de Mattei’s visit and the response it generated. We hope to be able to announce several new events of this kind shortly!