I went to a funeral here last year. It's a big, old school church, made with tons of stone, which gives it a different feel from a lot of other churches. The effect is beautiful, though. The floor with the pews on it is a slight step higher than the aisles for some reason, so I almost tripped getting into a pew.
I know the new pastor here, and he's an awesome guy. I love the 12 apostle statues behind the altar; my church growing up had these too. There are also 12 big flags for the apostles going down the length of the church. I was really proud of myself for identifying them as the apostles' flags after seeing the different symbols on them.
I showed up here to take pictures today as a noon Mass was getting out, and there were an impressive number of people in the congregation. Today is the feast of St. Maria Goretti, and the parish happened to have a relic of her there after the Mass, so I picked the best possible day to show up.
 |
| Waiting for the relic |
 |
| The relic |
According to the pastor, an old pastor kept everything in the church more or less the same after Vatican II, so the front edifice of the church looks great. For some reason there used to be three tabernacles, but only one is left. The second one is in the rectory, and the third one now houses the oils. I learned that this is called the ambry.
Sadly, the balcony was locked up, but I bet it's totally awesome up there. It's one of the highest ones I've seen. There was vandalism in an RI church a few days ago, so it looks like I might need to curb my unsolicited explorations for now, because people are probably on edge.
 |
| :( |
One last detail I loved - one of the stained glass windows features Mary holding the church building in her arms. I forgot to take a picture of the church from the outside, but it's a totally recognizable likeness.
No comments:
Post a Comment