A beautiful shrine honoring Our Lady at the Oratory of Sts. Cyril and Methodius in Bridgeport, CT. The statue was crowned yesterday before the 10:15 Mass.

Fr. Richard Cipolla was the celebrant today of the Solemn Mass at St. Roch Church in Greenwich, CT. Fr. Carl McIntosh, the pastor of St Roch’s was the deacon and Mr. William Riccio was the subdeacon.

New York, Boston, Philadelphia and … Bardstown? Furthermore, what could be the connection between this not-very-well-known Kentucky town and Naples, Italy? And what are its remote links not just with one, but two Catholic chivalric orders?

Bardstown, KY today is a quaint town  – population 13,000 – with numerous buildings from the 1770’s onwards. It resembles Litchfield or Farmington, CT, Deerfield or Salem, MA – all localities once important in preindustrial America but subsequently bypassed by economic progress and therefore fortunately preserved. Bardstown, however, has unique Catholic significance. For it was to this region that Catholic settlers came to establish a new community west of the Alleghenies.  These first Catholics, moreover, were in large part descendants of the original English Catholic population of Maryland. 1)

It was perhaps in recognition of these connections with Maryland that Bardstown became  – along with three other cities even then much more prominent – one of the first four new dioceses of the United States, carved in 1808 out of the original diocese of Baltimore.  And this status was probably also thanks to the efforts of its indomitable first bishop, Mgr. Benedict Joseph Flaget of France. The diocesan territory was unimaginably vast. Yet already between 1816 and 1823 Bishop Flaget built a new cathedral. It seems that both Catholics and Protestants contributed to its construction. St. Joseph’s stands, essentially unchanged, to this very day. 

Now this cathedral was designed by an American architect (John Rogers) in a quintessentially American style, very much like contemporary Protestant churches and secular buildings. It features “Catholic” statues on its façade and “Protestant” inscriptions of the Ten Commandments on the exterior walls of the nave. 

The columned façade is most impressive. We note there a plaque dedicated by the “Order of the Alhambra,” a kind of Catholic Shriners (they sport a white fez). Inside, the white columned interior is severe but festive. We read that the columns were originally great trees from the immediate vicinity cut down for this church. Photographs show us that up to the 1950’s the sanctuary was a pretty neo-Gothic affair undoubtedly dating to Victorian times. What is present there now, unfortunately, is a typical post-Conciliar “renovation.”

Around New York City, starting circa 1939, proto-Conciliar Catholics waxed enthusiastic about using imitations of the “enlightened” style of the American “meetinghouse” for Catholic churches (like Corpus Christi or, later, the Elizabeth Seton shrine).  In Bardstown, before 1820, Catholics were already building their churches in a bright neoclassical idiom – but as part of the original architectural movement!

But here the resemblance with the 20th century “Americanist” architecture ceases. Because Bishop Flaget by no means wanted just an austere, unadorned interior but sought to embellish it in a Catholic manner despite the limited resources at his disposal. And the main element of decoration would be framed paintings. A Belgian priest, working for the diocese, acquired a number of artworks in Europe. But outside assistance would also be necessary – and many more items indeed came as gifts. For at that time the “American Catholic Church” was still dependant on the aid of Catholics – especially the reigning princes and their officials – of Europe and Latin America. 

The pope himself contributed a number of paintings. The exact role of the future king Louis Philippe of France in providing support to Bardstown cathedral is disputed. But there seems to be a record of a gift from him of vestments, furnishings for the sanctuary, sacramental vessels and paintings from around 1823. The then Duke of Orleans had become acquainted with bishop Flaget during the time both were exiles from revolutionary France. The wife of Louis Philippe was a princess of the Neapolitan Bourbons. And a major donation of paintings from Francis I, king of the two Sicilies, (reigned 1825-1830) is obvious – numerous gold frames around the church record a dedication from him. The Sacred Military Constantinian Order of Saint George – so visibly active in the Traditionalist cause around New York – should be overjoyed.  For the Bourbon kings of Sicily were the heads and patrons of that order. 

Much of this early donated art remains on display high on the walls of the cathedral. Regrettably, the paintings are indifferently lit and seem to be in need of restoration – so it is, in general, hard to form a judgment of their artistic merit. Subject to further research, for example,  I am not sure that the cathedral’s claim to possess works by “van Dyke, Rubens and van Eyck” is sustainable.  The attribution of one dramatic and powerful painting is, however, secure: a Martyrdom of St. Bartholomew by Mattia Preti (1613-1699) – one of the gifts of King Francis I. Preti continued the style of Caravaggio to the end of the 17th century. He joined the Order of St. John – the knights of Malta –  and worked for many years on the island of Malta itself. What a contrast between this dark, dramatic work and the surrounding neoclassical serenity of this church’s interior! This painting was restored carefully by the J. Paul Getty Museum in 2002 and is in fine condition.

Bardstown’s ecclesiastical glory was short-lived. In 1841 Bishop Flaget moved his cathedral to the upcoming city of Louisville, taking with him some of the paintings. And Louisville itself was even then being far surpassed by other more recently founded Catholic dioceses west of the Alleghenies: Cincinnati, St. Louis, Chicago and many more. St. Joseph’s of Bardstown become an ordinary parish church. It briefly came to national attention again in the 1950’s when some of the paintings were stolen and quickly recovered. Nowadays Bardstown is known, if at all, mainly to those touring the many local bourbon distilleries.  But the church of St. Joseph of Bardstown still stands as a remarkable, relatively intact monument to the earliest days of Catholicism in the United States and to the distinguished artistic taste of that far-off time. 

1. Also near Bardstown is the famous Trappist abbey of Gethsemani.

At St. Cecilia Church in Brooklyn, New York.

In the church of Saints Cyril and Methodius, Bridgeport, CT:

Yesterday evening, Solemn Mass for the Feast of the Purification of the Blessed Virgin at St. Mary’s Church, Norwalk, CT. Fr. Novajosky was celebrant.

For all fans of Sigrid Undset’s medieval novels, a beautiful photographic essay by Micah Mattix on the wooden churches of Norway – in The American Conservative.

Norway’s Stave Churches

The “Italian Cathedral” – thus does the church of St Lucy in Newark, New Jersey, assert its claim to preeminence among Italian churches of the New York area. And with some justification! St Lucy’s may not quite attain the size and splendor of the “Polish cathedrals” of Chicago and elsewhere in the Midwest. Yet its architecture is impressive – unconstrained by the narrow lots of New York. And, in my view, its decoration exceeds in its extravagance and quality that of its Italian competitors – most notably, Our Lady of Pompeii in Greenwich Village, built and decorated about the same time. We had a chance to visit St. Lucy’s today on the weekend of the celebration of the festa of St. Gerard Majella – whose national shrine is found here.

(Above)The sober exterior of St Lucy’s, executed in a kind of Romanesque – Renaissance idiom. Construction started in 1925. The church presides today over a combination of plaza, parking lot and outdoor shrine offering the opportunity for all kinds of devotions. (Below) Peering over St Lucy’s parish complex are the towers of Newark’s grand Sacred Heart Cathedral (presumably the “Irish” Cathedral).

But it is the architecture and decoration of the interior that is the glory of this church. For here the local Italian community was able to achieve an amazing recreation of the 18th century Southern Italian Baroque. The parish is dedicated to St Lucy of Syracuse; the paintings and inscriptions emphasize strongly this Sicilian connection. But in fact people from many other Southern Italian villges, towns and regions participated in the life of this parish and in the construction of the church. (Below) The high altar.

The real heart of this decorative program, however, are the murals of Gonippo Raggi (1875-1959) who worked on the decoration of many other important Catholic churches – especially in New Jersey. Above all the paintings of the cupola and of the huge ceiling of the nave recall to the visitor not only Italy but, in their wild exuberance, even the visionary ceiling paintings of the German baroque.

(Above) The cupola.(Below) The apse mural, complete with the Syracuse cathedral on the left and Mount Etna on the right.

(Above) Detail of the apse.

(Above and below) Details of the martyrdom of St Lucy on the celing of the nave.

(Below) From the same mural.

Today, perhaps, St Lucy’s is best known as the shrine of St Gerard Majella. In contrast to the deserted shrines of most Manhattan churches, devotion to St Gerard is very much alive and well. I hear many come from all over the country to participate in the festa. This year was, obviously and unfortunately, a great exception.

St. Gerard Majella is most often invoked as an intercessor for a safe childbirth. At one time St Lucy’s had 20,000 parishioners, and in one year there were over 1,000 baptisms. So his assistance was very much in demand!

The statue of St. Gerard is adorned by the faithful not merely with strips with dollar bills attached – that happens in every other Italian church festival – but with whole coats covered with greenbacks. At least on this weekend, the stream of visitors never let up. The quantity of (real) candles to be found everywhere in the church is amazing. A notice is provided, however, that candles will be extinguished in the evening but relit in the morning.

(Below) The miraculous safe delivery of a child, depicted here, started the devotion to St. Gerard as a patron saint of expectant mothers.

After the murals, what catches the vistor’s attention are the innumerable, mostly large-scale statues around the church. It seems like every saint and every Marian devotion of Southern Italy is represented here. And the Hispanic peoples subsequently have added their own devotional images to this collection.

St Lucy’s is still kept in beautiful condition. Almost all the Italian population of what once was Newark’s “Little Italy, ” however, had left the immediate neighborhood long ago. The final straw was a series of disastrous urban renewal projects, which had the same results here as everywhere else – Chicago, St Louis, Bridgeport etc.. Most of the old Catholic ethnic neighborhoods of these cities, like those of Newark, were destroyed long ago . But St Lucy’s old parishioners and their descendants have been more dedicated than most in maintaining their old parish, its devotions and its church.