ST MONICA’S CATHEDRAL
CAIRNS, QUEENSLAND CATHOLIC
PAUL SCOTT
St Monica’s Cathedral is aligned with the main city grid, with its main door opening to Abbott Street. We shall use liturgical directions on this site, with liturgical East (capital letter) approximating geographic southwest. The liturgical directions are indicated in the satellite photograph.
The building is essentially a high rectangle with a ‘verandah’ surround on three sides, containing a chapel, confessionals, sacristy and offices. A circular baptistry stands out at the Southwest corner.
I can find no plan for this Cathedral. However, we shall begin our tour at Abbott Street and walk around the outside in a clockwise direction. We then enter the Cathedral and explore the nave, sanctuary and Blessed Sacrament Chapel which is near the Northeast corner.
Or, if you wish to go inside the Cathedral immediately, tap / click on START.
You can access intermediate points in the tour by a tap / click on the following links:
NOTE ON MAGNIFYING IMAGES
With this website format the images are large enough for most purposes. If there is a need for greater magnification of an image, go to the identical photo on
https://www.flickr.com/photos/paulscottinfo/albums
and use Command - + (Mac) or Windows - + (Windows).
HISTORY
[Wikipedia]
St Monica’s Cathedral (also known as St Monica’s War Memorial Cathedral) is the cathedral church of the Catholic Diocese of Cairns. It is located at 183 Abbott Street, Cairns, Queensland. The Cathedral was designed by Ian Ferrier and built from 1967 to 1968. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 31 August 1998.
St Monica’s War Memorial Cathedral, dedicated as a memorial to the Battle of the Coral Sea, was constructed in 1967–68. The Cathedral is surrounded by the Old Cathedral, Bishop’s House, St Joseph’s Convent and St Monica’s High School Administration Building, which together form a highly intact ecclesiastical group. St Monica’s War Memorial Cathedral is the only Cathedral in Cairns. The seat of the Anglican Bishops in the region was Thursday Island, for the Diocese of Carpentaria, but this was later incorporated into the Diocese of North Queensland centred in Townsville.
An extensive further history of St Monica’s Cathedral can be found under the link ...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Monica%27s_Cathedral,_Cairns
