St. Patrick’s

Did you know, or care, that St. Patrick’s Cathedral, in Manhattan, is on land first owned by the Jesuits.  They paid 11K for it to build a boy’s school.  The school failed and next tenants were French Trappists running from Napoleon.  I guess it was quiet in that part of New York at the time for the Trappists to think they could have their quiet.  When Napoleon fell, the Trappists returned to France.  That was 1814.  The New York Diocese owned the land.  Pius XI made New York an Archdiocese in 1950, Archbishop Dagger John, an Irish immigrant, decided to build a big time church for a big time city, New York City being the center of the universe, right!  Cornerstone in 1858 and completion in 1879.  The Irish can do it right but it takes time, and lots of pennies, and thus the name “St. Patrick’s.”  It is still my favorite church since I used to run around Manhattan as a messenger boy in the early 60s and stop in there.  It was only two blocks from where I worked for an advertising company.  Ya gotta go there even if you believe nothing.  It seats 2400.  So it is big with vaulted ceiling and flying buttresses,  with lots of art.  As churches go, it was my first love and one never forgets their first love.