Thursday, January 31, 2008

Small City, Grandiose Church: Guelph, Ontario

Canada is a country that has many beautiful churches, particularly gothic revival churches within English Canada.

One thing that is particularly gratifying to me is when I comes across grandiose churches that are either in small cities, towns, villages, even rural areas. Often their stories are quite interesting, either denoting some sort of local aspirations, local connections to people of influence, or at very least denoting the presence of an early and concentrated Catholic community for which such a church served Catholics for miles around.

One such church in my own locale is the "Church of Our Lady" in the city of Guelph, or more properly, the Church of Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception. What is particularly edifying about it, in addition to its wonderful gothic revival form, is that it is set upon a hill in the midst of that city at the end of a main street, making the Church all the more dramatic in appearance and visible for quite a distance. The grounds that surround it are wonderful as well.



A bit of history and then some more photos:

"From the earliest days of the settlement of Guelph, Catholics have played a role in the life of the community. Bishop Macdonell, the Bishop of Kingston, who was responsible for the Catholic Church in Ontario, was a friend of John Galt, the founder of Guelph. He had supported Galt's work with the Canada Company, which was charged with developing much of the land in southern Ontario. When Galt established the new settlement on April 23, 1827, he gave to the Catholic Church the hill in the center of the town. In is Autobiography he writes: "a beautiful central hill was reserved for the Catholics, in compliment to my friend, Bishop Macdonell, for his advice in the formation of the Company." A road was cleared leading up to the hill: Macdonell Street. In the autumn of 1827 Bishop Macdonell was one of the first visitors to the new settlement."






(Source: Blogguelph.com)


(Source: Blogguelph.com)














(Photo by Dan Cardoso)


(Photo by Dan Cardoso)

More recent articles:


Early Bird Registration Discount for CMAA Colloquium Ends March 31st!
Join us this summer for world-class training in the Church’s treasury of sacred music.Early bird registration discount ($50 for colloquium, $50 for Vocal Intensive course, $150 off for Chant Intensive) ends March 31st!Here’s a special invitation from our new president, Fr. Robert Pasley.The Church Music Association of America is pleased to announc...

The Annunciation 2025: Dante and the Virgin Mary
The specific date of birth of the great poet Dante Alighieri (1265-1321) is unknown, but this Thursday, March 27th, is the anniversary of his baptism, which took place during the Easter vigil of 1266. The language which we call “Italian” today originated as the dialect of his native region of Tuscany (more specifically, of the city of Florence, but...

The Messenger Angel
Anonymous, the Archangel Gabriel, depicted on the predella of the high altar at the subsidiary church of Pesenbach, Upper Austria, 1495In the traditional Roman calendar, the feast days of saints are sometimes clustered together to form archipelagos of holiness that allow the faithful to meditate longer on a sacred mystery. These archipelagos do not...

The Third Sunday of Lent 2025
At that time: Jesus was casting out a devil, and the same was dumb: and when he had cast out the devil, the dumb spoke: and the multitudes were in admiration at it: But some of them said: He casteth out devils by Beelzebub, the prince of devils. And others tempting, asked of him a sign from heaven. But he seeing their thoughts, said to them: Every ...

Pictures of Montecassino Abbey
Following up on yesterday’s post of pictures of the crypt of Montecassino Abbey, here are some of the main church and some of the things around it, starting with the most important part of it, the burial site of St Benedict and his sister St Scholastica, behind the high altar.As I am sure our readers know, Montecassino Abbey was heavily bombed duri...

The Prodigal Son in the Liturgy of Lent
In his commentary on the Gospel of St Matthew, St Jerome writes as follows about the parable of the two sons who are ordered by their father to go and work in the vineyard (21, 28-32). “These are the two sons who are described in Luke’s parable, the frugal (or ‘virtuous’) and the immoderate (or ‘wanton’).” He then connects these two sons with the f...

Another Chant for the Byzantine Liturgy of the Presanctified
Now the powers of heaven invisibly worship with us, for behold, the King of Glory entereth! Behold, the mystical sacrifice, being perfected, is carried forth in triumph. With faith and love, let us come forth, that we may become partakers of eternal life, Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia! (Recording by the Lviv Archeparchial Clergy Choir.) Нині сили ...

The Crypt of Montecassino Abbey
For the feast of St Benedict, here are some pictures of the crypt of the abbey of Montecassino, the site where he ended his days. The crypt was built in the early 16th century, and originally decorated with frescoes, but by the end of the 19th century, these had deteriorated so badly from the humidity that they were deemed unsalvageable. The decisi...

An Interview with Fr Uwe Michael Lang on Liturgy
I am sure that our readers will enjoy this interview with the liturgical scholar Fr Uwe Michael Lang of the London Oratory, which was recently published on the YouTube channel of the Totus Tuus Apostolate. It covers a wide range of subjects: Pope Benedict’s teaching on the liturgy, the liturgical abuses in the post-Conciliar period and our own time...

Dives and Lazarus in the Liturgy of Lent
Before the early eighth century, the church of Rome kept the Thursdays of Lent (with the obvious exception of Holy Thursday) and the Saturdays after Ash Wednesday and Passion Sunday as “aliturgical” days. (The term aliturgical refers, of course, only to the Eucharistic liturgy, not to the Divine Office.) This is attested in the oldest liturgical bo...

For more articles, see the NLM archives: