It's not that it's
that big, so much as that the parish chose not to incur debt with the building of their new Gothic Revival church, so it can then be seen that it required 32 years to acquire the funds to pay for the building.
Built predominately of local granite (quarried near Shelburne, about 135 road kilometres to the southeast), Saint Bernard was doubtless an expensive church to build. The outside walls contain upwards of 8,000 granite blocks and several tonnes of mortar. The inside walls required 96 tonnes of plaster in two coats over wooden laths. The top coat was roughed and scored to simulate stones.
Built in the shape of a cross, with transepts on either side at the rear, Saint Bernard has matching towers at the front with crenelated tops and straight stone spires at each corner. Between these towers is the main entry, consisting of three sets of double doors, each within its own heavy stone Gothic archway and topped with a large glassed transom broken up with arched and vertical tracery. Multiple carved stone Ionic columns support each arch. Similar doorways in the sides of the front towers have single doors within ogee arched stone archways. These have large glassed transoms as well, with tracery forming lancets and quatrefoil patterns. All the doors are identical, built up of heavy wood planks with diamond patterns in the bottom halves and rafter patterns in the upper halves. Each is painted bright red and hung on long wrought iron hinges.
Windows in the towers are tall and narrow, matching the windows in the rest of the building. All windows are Gothic arched with heavy tracery at the top. The sanctuary itself is very tall, with lower aisles on each side between towers and transepts.
Open to visitors May 1 to Oct 30, the church also hosts the
Musique Saint-Bernard concert series throughout the summer months.
Parish – Paroisse Saint Bernard
...a church was not built at Saint-Bernard until 1855; until that date, the parishioners were served by Paroisse Sainte-Marie in Church Point (Pointe-de-l’Église). Monseigneur William Walsh, Archbishop of Halifax, blessed the new church at Saint-Bernard on June 20, 1855. This church was located on the ch. Petit Paradis Road, with the parish cemetery adjacent to the church.
Of note is the tenure of Père Edouard LeBlanc. A native of Saint-Bernard parish and born in Ohio (Digby County), he had been the pastor of St-Vincent-de-Paul at Salmon River (Rivière-aux-Saumons). In 1907. he was appointed pastor of St. Bernard and it was he who undertook the construction of the current magnificent granite church.
The Saint-Bernard church was built of Shelburne (Nova Scotia) granite, which was brought in by rail car to Little Brook Station and then by ox cart to the construction site. The parish was determined to not incur debt so the church took thirty-two years to build. Father Élie LeBlanc, who became pastor in 1937, was tasked with overseeing the completion of the new church and witnessing its blessing in 1942. The new church was blessed by His Excellency Archbishop McNally on September 1942 and the first mass was celebrated in French.
From Claire Township