ST PATRICK’S CATHEDRAL

MELBOURNE, VICTORIA       CATHOLIC

PAUL SCOTT

HISTORY

[Wikipedia]

The Cathedral Church and Minor Basilica of Saint Patrick (colloquially St Patrick’s Cathedral) is the Cathedral church of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Melbourne in Victoria, Australia, and seat of its archbishop, currently Peter Comensoli.

In 1974 Pope Paul VI conferred the title and dignity of minor basilica on it. In 1986 Pope John Paul II visited the Cathedral and addressed clergy during his Papal Visit.

The Cathedral is built on a traditional east-west axis, with the altar at the eastern end, symbolising belief in the resurrection of Christ. The plan is in the style of a Latin cross, consisting of a nave with side aisles, transepts with side aisles, a sanctuary with seven chapels, and sacristies. Although its 103.6-metre (340 ft) length is marginally shorter than that of St Mary’s Cathedral, Sydney, St Patrick’s has the distinction of being both the tallest and, overall, the largest church building in Australia.

Location
The Cathedral is located on Eastern Hill in Melbourne, in an area bounded by Albert Street, Gisborne Street, Lansdowne Street and Cathedral Place. Just to the west across Gisborne Street is St Peter’s Church, constructed from 1846 to 1848, which is the Anglican parish church of Melbourne.

History
In 1848, the Augustinian friar James Goold was appointed the first bishop of Melbourne and became the fourth bishop in Australia, after Sydney, Hobart and Adelaide. Negotiations with the colonial government for the grant of five acres of land for a church in the Eastern Hill area began in 1848. On 1 April 1851, only 16 years after the foundation of Melbourne, the Colonial Secretary of Victoria finally granted the site to the Roman Catholic Church.

Goold decided to build his Cathedral on the Eastern Hill site.

Since the Catholic community of Melbourne was at the time almost entirely Irish, the Cathedral was dedicated to St Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland.

William Wardell, Melbourne’s foremost ecclesiastical architect was commissioned to prepare plans for a Cathedral, but the project was delayed by severe labour shortages during the Gold Rush of 1851, which drew almost every able-bodied man in the colony to the goldfields, and the foundation stone was not laid until 1858. An earlier building by stonemason David Mitchell (father of Nellie Melba and later partner of John Monash) was demolished for the Cathedral. The Cathedral was designed in the Gothic style of late Thirteenth Century, based on the great medieval Cathedrals of England. This was in response to the revival of Gothic architecture as promoted by Augustus Welby Pugin and others as the most appropriate for the building of churches. The style is specifically Geometric Decorated Gothic, showing this style at its most complex in the large west window of the nave. The eastern arm with its chevet of radiating chapels in the French manner is still principally in the English late Thirteenth Century style, giving the most complete essay attempted in that style during the Nineteenth Century. William Wardell was a remarkably ambitious and capable architect; he went on to design the second St Mary’s Cathedral, Sydney in a similar style, even larger than St Patrick’s, but with a completely English square East End. The statue in the foreground is of the Irish nationalist leader Daniel O’Connell.

In 1974 Pope Paul VI conferred the title and dignity of minor basilica on it. In 1986 Pope John Paul II visited the Cathedral and addressed clergy during his Papal Visit. The building also saw a green ban in the 1970s.

Construction
In 1858 William Wardell was commissioned to plan the Cathedral with a contract signed on 8 December 1858 and building commencing the same year.

Although the nave was completed within ten years, construction proceeded slowly, and was further delayed by the severe depression which hit Melbourne in 1891. Under the leadership of Archbishop Thomas Carr the Cathedral was consecrated in 1897 and even then it was not finished. Given the size of the Catholic community at the time, the massive bluestone Gothic Cathedral was an immense and very expensive undertaking, and there were long delays while funds were raised. St Patrick’s was one of the two largest churches brought to substantial completion anywhere in the world in the 19th century. The other is St Patrick’s Cathedral, New York, United States.

Daniel Mannix, who became Archbishop of Melbourne in 1917, maintained a constant interest in the Cathedral, which he was determined to see finished after the long delays during the previous 30 years. He oversaw the addition of the spires and other elements in the late 1930s. The building was officially completed in 1939.

The Cathedral is 103.6 metres (340 ft) long on its long axis, 56.4 metres (185 ft) wide across the transepts and 25.3 metres (83 ft) wide across the nave. The nave and transepts are 28.9 metres (95 ft) high. The central spire is 105 metres (344 ft) high and the flanking towers and spires are 61.9 metres (203 ft) high. The bluestone used in its construction was sourced from basalt deposits in nearby Footscray.

Restoration
To celebrate the centenary of its consecration in 1997, the Cathedral was closed throughout 1994 to be upgraded. Nothing was added to the main building. Rather, it underwent significant conservation work, with funds contributed by the federal and Victorian governments, corporate and philanthropic donors and the community of Melbourne.

The Cathedral’s stained glass windows had buckled and cracked and required a full year to restore to their original state. Teams of stonemasons and stained-glass craftsmen used ‘lime mortars and materials long-forgotten by the building trade – like medieval times’. The 1992-97 restoration works were undertaken under the guidance of Falkinger Andronas Architects and Heritage Consultants. The works were awarded the Royal Australian Institute of Architects (Victorian Chapter) John George Knight Award for Heritage Architecture 1996. One of the gargoyles restored by the masonry team was modelled on the then-Premier of Victoria, Jeff Kennett.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Patrick%27s_Cathedral,_Melbourne