St. Aloysius' Catholic Church (Carthagena, Ohio)

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St. Aloysius Catholic Church
St. Aloysius' Catholic Church, Carthagena.jpg
Front and eastern side of the church
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LocationJunction of U.S. Route 127 and State Route 274 at Carthagena, Ohio
Coordinates 40°26′11″N84°34′12″W / 40.43639°N 84.57000°W / 40.43639; -84.57000 Coordinates: 40°26′11″N84°34′12″W / 40.43639°N 84.57000°W / 40.43639; -84.57000
Area15 acres (6.1 ha)
Built1875
Architect Anton DeCurtins
Architectural style Gothic Revival
MPS Cross-Tipped Churches of Ohio TR
NRHP reference # 79002824 [1]
Added to NRHPJuly 26, 1979

St. Aloysius' Catholic Church is a historic Roman Catholic church in Carthagena, an unincorporated community in Marion Township, Mercer County, Ohio, United States. Built in the late nineteenth century, it remains the home of an active parish, and it has been designated a historic site because of its well-preserved architecture.

Catholic Church Christian church led by the Bishop of Rome

The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with approximately 1.3 billion baptised Catholics worldwide as of 2016. As the world's "oldest continuously functioning international institution", it has played a prominent role in the history and development of Western civilisation. The church is headed by the Bishop of Rome, known as the Pope. Its central administration, the Holy See, is in the Vatican City, an enclave within the city of Rome in Italy.

Church (building) building constructed for Christian worship

A church building or church house, often simply called a church, is a building used for Christian religious activities, particularly for Christian worship services. The term is often used by Christians to refer to the physical buildings where they worship, but it is sometimes used to refer to buildings of other religions. In traditional Christian architecture, the church is often arranged in the shape of a Christian cross. When viewed from plan view the longest part of a cross is represented by the aisle and the junction of the cross is located at the altar area.

Carthagena is an unincorporated community in Mercer County, Ohio, United States. It has an elevation of 909 feet (277 m) and is located at 40°26′12″N84°33′36″W.

Contents

Early parish history

Local Catholics began to purchase large amounts of land in Cathagena from Black people in 1856; the parish grew strong enough to establish a school and a cemetery in 1860, [2] :230 and St. Aloysius' Church was canonically erected in 1865. [3] In their earliest years, the people worshipped in the chapel of the adjacent St. Charles Seminary. [2] :230 Throughout its history, the church has been significantly influenced by the seminary, which trained the priests of the Missionaries of the Precious Blood [4] and provided pastors for the church. [2] :231

Black people is a term used in certain countries, often in socially based systems of racial classification or of ethnicity, to describe persons who are perceived to be dark-skinned compared to other populations. As such, the meaning of the expression varies widely both between and within societies, and depends significantly on context. For many other individuals, communities and countries, "black" is also perceived as a derogatory, outdated, reductive or otherwise unrepresentative label, and as a result is neither used nor defined.

Cemetery Place of burial

A cemetery or graveyard is a place where the remains of dead people are buried or otherwise interred. The word cemetery implies that the land is specifically designated as a burial ground and originally applied to the Roman catacombs. The term graveyard is often used interchangeably with cemetery, but a graveyard primarily refers to a burial ground within a churchyard.

Aloysius Gonzaga 16th-century Italian Jesuit seminarian and saint

Saint Aloysius de Gonzaga, SJ was an Italian aristocrat who became a member of the Society of Jesus. While still a student at the Roman College, he died as a result of caring for the victims of a serious epidemic. He was beatified in 1605 and canonized in 1726.

As its membership grew, the parish decided to construct a church building. Plans were laid and construction began in 1875; the cornerstone was laid in May 1877, and the church was consecrated on June 30, 1878; [2] :230 the parishioners had performed the construction work themselves. [4] Under the pastorate of Gregory Jüssel, the church was greatly modified in the summer of 1905; only the tower and three of the walls remain from the original structure. [2] :230–231

Cornerstone ceremonial stone set at the corner of a building

The cornerstone is the first stone set in the construction of a masonry foundation, important since all other stones will be set in reference to this stone, thus determining the position of the entire structure.

Consecration is the solemn dedication to a special purpose or service, usually religious. The word consecration literally means "association with the sacred". Persons, places, or things can be consecrated, and the term is used in various ways by different groups. The origin of the word comes from the Latin word consecrat, which means dedicated, devoted, and sacred. A synonym for to consecrate is to sanctify; a distinct antonym is to desecrate.

Church building

Stained glass window of St. Aloysius receiving his first Communion from St. Charles Saint Aloysius Church (Carthagena, Ohio), interior, stained glass, St. Aloysius receives first Communion from St. Charles.jpg
Stained glass window of St. Aloysius receiving his first Communion from St. Charles

St. Aloysius' Church is a Gothic Revival structure, five bays long and three bays wide, and officially one story high. Built of brick, laid in a stretcher bond, the walls rest on a foundation of stone rubble from Piqua, which includes a basement. A gabled roof of asphalt covers the rectangular church, [4] which measures 85 feet (26 m) long and 45 feet (14 m) wide. [2] :230 One of the church's most prominent architectural elements is its tower: equipped with a white-painted wooden belfry and a tall spire, [4] the tower rests on its own walls, 2 feet (0.61 m) thick. The entire building cost approximately $7,500 to erect; much of this amount was donated by other nearby parishes. [2] :230 Inside, the church's sanctuary includes elements such as white-painted altars and multiple sizes of pews: large pews for adults, and miniature pews for children. The interior is lit partially by many large stained glass windows; added more than 25 years after the church was completed, these windows were purchased by individual families within the parish. [4] Few elements of the church are original from the 1870s. The middle of 1905 saw the completion of a wide range of alterations, [2] :230 including the removal of the original interior, the addition of a sacristy, the placement of the present stained glass windows, and the expansion of the sanctuary. [2] :231

Gothic Revival architecture architectural movement

Gothic Revival is an architectural movement popular in the Western World that began in the late 1740s in England. Its popularity grew rapidly in the early 19th century, when increasingly serious and learned admirers of neo-Gothic styles sought to revive medieval Gothic architecture, in contrast to the neoclassical styles prevalent at the time. Gothic Revival draws features from the original Gothic style, including decorative patterns, finials, lancet windows, hood moulds and label stops.

Bay (architecture) space defined by the vertical piers, in a building

In architecture, a bay is the space between architectural elements, or a recess or compartment. Bay comes from Old French baee, meaning an opening or hole.

Storey level part of a building that could be used by people

A storey or story is any level part of a building with a floor that could be used by people. The plurals are "storeys" and "stories", respectively.

Architectural historians have divided the Precious Blood-related churches of western Ohio into four generations. Most of the first-generation churches were small frame structures; only four of these buildings (three of which are brick) — have survived; two have been converted for other purposes, one has been greatly modified, and only St. John's Church in Fryburg remains in a condition resembling its original state. [5] :2 St. Aloysius' is a member of the second generation of churches, [4] which comprises the buildings completed between 1865 and 1885. Most of these buildings were simple brick structures with small bell towers; conversely, St. Aloysius' was the first church in the region to be designed with a tall tower. Its construction was a turning point in the ecclesiastical architecture of the region: after its construction, most of the area's churches were modified by the construction of similar towers, and later structures were generally designed likewise. [5] :2 Furthermore, Anton DeCurtins' commission to design the church at Carthagena, where he lived, led to similar requests from many other parishes: the churches of the third generation, built between 1885 and 1905, were characteristically large brick High Gothic Revival structures, dominated by tall towers, and designed by Anton or his sons. [5] :3

Framing (construction) in construction, is the fitting together of pieces to give a structure support and shape

Framing, in construction, is the fitting together of pieces to give a structure support and shape. Framing materials are usually wood, engineered wood, or structural steel. The alternative to framed construction is generally called mass wall construction, where horizontal layers of stacked materials such as log building, masonry, rammed earth, adobe, etc. are used without framing.

St. Johns Catholic Church (Fryburg, Ohio)

St. John Catholic Church is a Roman Catholic church in the unincorporated community of Fryburg in Pusheta Township, Auglaize County, Ohio, United States. The parish was established in 1848, the same year in which the community was platted, and construction was completed in 1850. A Catholic school in connection with the church was established in 1877. Both buildings feature fine architecture: the church includes Gothic Revival elements such as ornate pilasters and lancet windows, while the former school is a good example of Federal architecture.

Fryburg, Ohio human settlement in United States of America

Fryburg is an unincorporated community located in central Pusheta Township, Auglaize County, Ohio, United States.

Stained glass windows

Stained glass window of St. Peter Claver Saint Aloysius Church (Carthagena, Ohio), interior, stained glass, St. Peter Claver.jpg
Stained glass window of St. Peter Claver

The church interior is adorned with Munich-style stained glass windows. The windows depict the life of the church patron saint, Aloysius Gonzaga, saints associated with other places having names similar to "Carthagena", and saints revered in German culture.

Munich-style stained glass

Munich-style stained glass was produced in the Royal Bavarian Stained Glass Manufactory, Munich, in the mid-19th century.

Patron saint saint regarded as the tutelary spirit or heavenly advocate of a nation, place, craft, activity, class, clan, family, or person

A patron saint, patroness saint, patron hallow or heavenly protector is a saint who in Roman Catholicism, Anglicanism or Eastern Orthodoxy, is regarded as the heavenly advocate of a nation, place, craft, activity, class, clan, family or person.

Subjects of the pictorial windows (as written on the windows, translated from German)

Two school buildings — one frame and one brick — were built approximately 0.5 miles (0.80 km) west of the church. These buildings were built for the Black community that lived in Carthagena before the current parish was in the area. In order to better serve the parish school, a house was erected for the nuns who taught there after they left the seminary building. [4] Many parishes in the Archdiocese of Cincinnati constructed rectories for their pastors in accord with an archiepiscopal directive in the early twentieth century; [5] :4 however, this was not necessary for St. Aloysius' Church, as its pastors always resided at the seminary. [2] :231 Moreover, two cemeteries are located in proximity to the church: the original Black cemetery, near U.S. Route 127 west of the church, and the parish cemetery, between the Black cemetery and the church. [4]

Recent history

Recognition

Church interior as viewed from the loft Saint Aloysius Church (Carthagena, Ohio), interior, view of nave from organ loft.jpg
Church interior as viewed from the loft

Architectural historians from the Ohio Historical Society surveyed St. Aloysius' Church in 1977 as part of a historic preservation effort known as the "Ohio Historic Inventory." This survey revealed that the church's interior was in good condition and its exterior in excellent condition; the only likely threats to its integrity were plans for continued interior remodelling. [4] In recognition of its well-preserved architecture, the church was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979. More than seventy other buildings at over thirty-five locations, including twenty-eight other churches, were listed on the Register at the same time as part of the "Cross-Tipped Churches Thematic Resources", a collection of architecturally significant buildings related to the Missionaries of the Precious Blood in far western Ohio. [1] The tall Gothic Revival towers of the many Catholic churches of this region, [5] :6 pioneered by that of St. Aloysius' Church, [5] :2 have become this region's namesake: it is known as the "Land of the Cross-Tipped Churches." [5] :6

Current status

St. Aloysius' Church continues as an active parish of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati to the present day. It is part of the St. Henry Cluster, along with St. Bernard Parish in Burkettsville, St. Francis Parish in Cranberry Prairie, St. Henry Parish in St. Henry, and St. Wendelin Parish in St. Wendelin. The entire cluster is a part of the St. Marys Deanery. [6]

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References

  1. 1 2 National Park Service (2009-03-13). "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places . National Park Service.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Scranton, S.S. History of Mercer County, Ohio and Representative Citizens. Chicago: Biographical, 1907.
  3. ↑ Fortin, Roger. Faith and Action: A History of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati 1821-1996 Archived 2011-07-27 at the Wayback Machine .. Columbus: Ohio State UP, 2002, 401.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Brown, Mary Ann. Ohio Historic Inventory Nomination: St. Aloysius Catholic Church. Ohio Historical Society, January 1977.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Brown, Mary Ann and Mary Niekamp. National Register of Historic Places Inventory/Nomination: Cross-Tipped Churches Thematic Resources . National Park Service, July 1978. Accessed 2010-03-03.
  6. ↑ The Futures Project, Archdiocese of Cincinnati. Accessed 2010-06-24.
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