The Cathedral is one of the oldest cathedrals in continuous use in the United States.
The following information comes from the Cathedral's website (
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When the seat of the diocese was moved from Bardstown to Louisville in 1841, Saint Louis Church then became Saint Louis Cathedral. In 1849, after a decision that a new cathedral should be built, it was begun by Bishop Flaget and completed by Bishop Martin John Spalding. The structure was dedicated as the Cathedral of the Assumption on October 3, 1852. (On October 3, 1852, the new Cathedral was dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary under the title of the Cathedral of the Assumption. Interesting to note, the new Cathedral was almost an identical but larger replica of its predecessor, St. Louis Church. Literally, the Cathedral was built around St. Louis Church, and once completed, St. Louis was disassembled and carried piece by piece out the front doors.)
Bishop Flaget died on February 11, 1850, a few months after the laying of the cornerstone for the new church building. His remains rest today in a crypt in the Cathedral Undercroft.
wenty years after being established in 1789, the first diocese in America (Baltimore) was subdivided into four other dioceses: New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and Bardstown (Kentucky). The first Bishop of Bardstown was Benedict Joseph Flaget, and the new diocese covered most of what are today the states of Kentucky, Tennessee, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and Michigan.
Our History
Interior of the Cathedral in 1906.
In 1811, a core group of Catholics in Louisville helped form Saint Louis Church at 10th and Main Streets. Until then, their needs had been served by Father Stephen Theodore Badin, the “circuit rider priest,” so named because of the wide area traveled during his ministry to the people of the American frontier. Father Badin was the first priest ordained in the United States.
Father Philip Hosten became the first pastor in residence at Saint Louis Church in September of 1821, but he died about a year later of yellow fever during an outbreak of the disease in the city. By 1830, the congregation had grown in size and a bigger church, also named Saint Louis Church, was built on Fifth Street, five blocks south of the Ohio River on the site of the present Cathedral of the Assumption.
In its early years, following the European tradition, the Cathedral of the Assumption was a center for responding to the needs of others and challenging the growth of individuals. It served as a hospice for the sick, the orphaned and the poor. Later, Presentation Academy, Saint Joseph Infirmary and Saint Vincent’s Orphanage all had their beginnings in the Cathedral basement. These early years became known as the golden age of the Cathedral of the Assumption.
According to Wikipedia's information on the Cathedral (
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The Diocese of Louisville was elevated in 1937 to become the Archdiocese of Louisville and the metropolitan province for all the dioceses in Kentucky and Tennessee.
The newly built Cathedral of the Assumption was nearly destroyed soon after its building due to anti-Catholic and anti-immigrant bigotry in the city of Louisville. On Monday, August 6th, 1856 George D. Prentice, editor of the Louisville Journal, placed an article of his own opinion in the paper that speculated the possibility of takeover by immigrants: German and Irish. This also included accusations of vote tampering. Fearing for their safety, the "Know Nothing Party" of Nativists bombarded and ambushed local immigrant workers with ammunition, in total killing roughly 22 German and Irish immigrants across the city. Also, the Cathedral and newly built St. Martin of Tours Church (1853) were believed to house weaponry in their basements. They were threatened to be burned, but the mayor of the city at the time, John Barbee, himself a "Know-Nothing," inspected the churches and cleared them of such accusations. Though these tragedies were avoided, twenty-two innocent lives were lost and several businesses burned to the ground.
During the renovation of the Cathedral by the Conrad Schmitt Studios, the walls were faux finished to resemble stone blocks. The effect is convincing enough that many visitors to the Cathedral are astonished to learn that the walls are not actual stone. In addition, much of the architectural work around the Coronation Window is a faux finish.
The stained glass that formerly stood in the side windows was removed to allow the congregation to view the surrounding buildings, in order to facilitate a sense of attachment to the community. The panels are now displayed in the front windows of the Cathedral's Patterson Education Center.
[edit] The Nave
The Nave, the body of the church, accommodates nine hundred sixty-six people for daily Masses and other ceremonies. The Nave has no pews, utilizing individual, movable chairs, complete with kneelers. Usually arranged in straight rows facing the altar and allowing for a center aisle and two side aisles, the chairs may also be placed in rows the length of the church, facing each other across the center aisle for special services such as those of Holy Thursday, Good Friday, and the Easter Vigil. It may also be noted that during the renovations by Conrad-Schmitt, the entire building was cracked down the middle and deeply in danger of collapse. To resolve this, steel strand beams were mounted from wall to wall in the nave to provide a counter push and pull action, keeping the building from falling in or out.
The Baptistry holds a prominent position in the church because through it one gains entrance into the Church. A person being baptized may choose either immersion in the pool or infusion, pouring of water from the font. The old baptismal font was relocated to the rear of the Nave, immediately inside the entrance doors, and an immersion pool, crafted of red granite, bronze, and marble from the original Communion rail, was added in the last renovation.
The altar, the center of worship in the church, incorporates a base of gray marble and a red granite table like the granite of the Baptismal pool. The gray marble was taken from the original high altar, which was removed from the back of the sanctuary in the renovation following Vatican II.
The brass Lamb of God, in Latin Agnus Dei, is a symbol of Jesus, the Paschal sacrifice offered on this altar. The gray marble base of the altar has carved on the right side an open book and several keys, on the left a bishop's mitre and crozier. The book represents God's word found in the Holy Scripture, the foundation of the bishop's teaching. The keys remind us of Christ's words to Peter, "I will give you the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven" (Matthew 16:19). The shape of the crozier recalls its origin as a shepherd's crook, or staff, suggesting the bishop's pastoral role, "Feed my lambs. Tend my sheep" (John 21:15–17).
The colorful Coronation Window, which illustrates the Cathedral's special dedication to the Virgin Mary, the Mother of Jesus, under the title of the "Cathedral of the Assumption."
The window, designed and installed by the Blum Art Company of Louisville in 1883, depicts the crowning of the Virgin Mary as Queen of Heaven. It is one of the oldest American-made stained glass windows. This window, in the early half of the 20th century had been moved to the front of the tower, with a new Assumption window replacing it. During restoration, the windows were switched to place the Coronation window in its original place in the sanctuary. It was in this crane-operated delicate process that the building was cracked, temporarily halting all work. Conrad Schmitt Studios conserved the historic glass and restored the original appearance of the windows by painting the missing artwork on 2mm slide glass and sandwiching them to the conserved glass before re-leading.
According to Catholic doctrine, after the Virgin Mary died, Jesus assumed her body into Heaven. As the first among the faithful, she is a sign of the eternal goal toward which all the faithful advance. Centuries of Christian artists honored Mary's preeminence by depicting her being crowned as Queen of Heaven.
The Ceiling Fresco depicts cherubs surrounding the Virgin Mary at the time of her Assumption into Heaven.
According to the Historic Structure Report of 1986, a Mr. Landrop, or Gandrop, of Cincinnati painted the fresco. The fresco remained until 1964, through many different changes to the interior. At that time, it was painted over after some plaster fell and was patched. It was rediscovered when again plaster fell from the ceiling, revealing the jewel that lay beneath. The fresco has been painstakingly restored to its earlier beauty.
The Cathedra, behind the altar, is the official Chair of the Archbishop. It is an ancient symbol of the tradition and authority of the bishop in the life of the Church. The Cathedra represents his three main offices of teaching, sanctifying and governing.
A cathedral houses the official chair of the bishop of the diocese. In Latin, the word chair is cathedra, from which the name cathedral is derived. The Cathedra, upholstered in red suede, has painted on its back the coat of arms of the Archdiocese of Louisville.
Symbols on the coat of arms, important to Louisville and the Archdiocese, include:
The fleur de lis, representing Louisville's French heritage
A crozier
A Star of David, an early symbol of the Virgin Mary
A stockade and water flowing downward, representing Fort Nelson and the Ohio River
Arrowheads representing the native peoples in this area
The presider's chair was purchased from a local antique store because of its similarity in design to the Cathedra. From here, the priest presides during the Mass.
Above the entrance are the choir loft and the magnificent pipe organ built by Steiner-Reck, Inc. of Louisville in 1983. The organ features three manuals and forty-three ranks. Fanfare trumpets were added in 1994, along with both 32-foot ranks, full MIDI capability, and a Gothic casework of hand-carved mahogany. The center section of the loft railing is original, featuring small pointed arches with a reproduction of the design on the side sections.