Dr. Kevin F. Decker
Department of History
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Dr. Kevin F. Decker
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Reprinted from:
Decker, Kevin F. "Grand and Godly Proportions: Roman Catholic Cathedral Churches of the Northeast, 1840-1900." Ph. D. diss., State University of New York at Albany, 2000.
During the nineteenth century, American Roman Catholics consciously attempted to create a bold architectural statement to impress their Protestant neighbors and critics. Nowhere was this desire more evident than in the construction of cathedral churches for the newly created dioceses in the northeastern United States between 1840 and 1900. Roman Catholics saw their cathedrals as a means to publicly proclaim their faith and reproach its critics in an age when anti-Catholicism was prevalent. In the process, American Catholics sought to emulate what they and most of their contemporaries regarded as the height of architectural fashion.
Examination of various aspects of the social and institutional development of the Roman Catholic Church in the United States throughout the nineteenth century, demonstrates how a variety of social forces combined with architectural trends to produce a uniquely Roman Catholic interpretation of Gothic Revival architecture. Separate subsections provide extensive and detailed stylistic analysis of specific cathedrals, and these selected examples illustrate the cultural issues and architectural developments chronicled throughout subsequent chapters. The funding of construction, the importance attached to site selection, and other relevant issues are examined thematically within the framework of a chronological architectural analysis. Numerous contemporary accounts provide evidence of both Roman Catholic pride and the surprisingly positive reaction of many American Protestants to these new cathedral churches.
The evidence presented also suggests that while Roman Catholics were not immune from prevailing architectural trends, they did encourages the development of a separatist culture. Lesser known ecclesiastical architects and artisans of the period who professed the Roman Catholic faith were almost exclusively employed, and Roman Catholics developed a strong bias for devotional objects and church furnishings imported from Europe. As the twentieth century approached, an observable monotony in architectural design was inspired, in part, by the increasing financial stability of the Roman Catholic Church. The epilogue notes subsequent architectural and liturgical developments, and the reaction of professional critics to the architectural expression of nineteenth-century American Roman Catholics, while concluding that the cathedrals were clearly a success when evaluated within the context of the architectural standards, liturgical practices, and social environment of their own day.
© Kevin F. Decker, 2000.
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