Immaculate Conception Cathedral is a historic church at 1218 East Jefferson Street in
Brownsville, Texas
Brownsville () is a city in Cameron County in the U.S. state of Texas. It is on the western Gulf Coast in South Texas, adjacent to the border with Matamoros, Mexico. The city covers , and has a population of 186,738 as of the 2020 census. It ...
,
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
. It is the
cathedral church
A cathedral is a church (building), church that contains the ''cathedra'' () of a bishop, thus serving as the central church of a diocese, Annual conferences within Methodism, conference, or episcopate. Churches with the function of "cathedral ...
for the
Roman Catholic Diocese of Brownsville
The Roman Catholic Diocese of Brownsville ( la, Dioecesis Brownsvillensis, es, Diócesis de Brownsville) is a Latin Church suffragan diocese in the ecclesiastical province of the Metropolitan Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston, in Texas, USA.
The ...
. It was built in 1856 and added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1980 as Immaculate Conception Church.
History
The
Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate
The Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate (OMI) is a missionary religious congregation in the Catholic Church. It was founded on January 25, 1816, by Eugène de Mazenod, a French priest born in Aix-en-Provence in the south of France on August 1, ...
were the first priests to celebrate Mass in the area of Brownsville in 1849.
The present
Gothic Revival
Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic, neo-Gothic, or Gothick) is an architectural movement that began in the late 1740s in England. The movement gained momentum and expanded in the first half of the 19th century, as increasingly ...
style building was designed by Peter Yves Keralum. The Oblates operated a seminary in the
rectory
A clergy house is the residence, or former residence, of one or more priests or ministers of religion. Residences of this type can have a variety of names, such as manse, parsonage, rectory or vicarage.
Function
A clergy house is typically ow ...
, which also was a haven for priests who fled the revolutions in Mexico.
[ The first Catholic bishop to reside at Immaculate Conception was ]Dominic Manucy
Dominic Manucy (December 20, 1823 – December 7, 1885) was an American prelate of the Catholic Church. He served as the first Vicar Apostolic of Brownsville (later the Diocese of Corpus Christi) from 1874 until his death in 1885, and also se ...
who was the Vicariate Apostolic of Brownsville. The Vicariate became the Diocese of Corpus Christi
The Diocese of Corpus Christi ( la, Dioecesis Corporis Christi) is a Latin Church ecclesiastical territory or diocese of the Catholic Church in southern Texas. It was founded on March 23, 1912, having been the Vicariate Apostolic of Brownsville u ...
in 1912.Pope Paul VI
Pope Paul VI ( la, Paulus VI; it, Paolo VI; born Giovanni Battista Enrico Antonio Maria Montini, ; 26 September 18976 August 1978) was head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City, Vatican City State from 21 June 1963 to his ...
established the Diocese of Brownsville from Corpus Christi[
]
See also
*List of Catholic cathedrals in the United States
The following is a list of the Catholic cathedrals in the United States. The Catholic Church in the United States comprises ecclesiastical territories called dioceses led by prelate bishops. Each bishop is assigned to a cathedral from which he ...
*List of cathedrals in the United States
This is a list of cathedrals in the United States, including both actual cathedrals (seats of bishops in episcopal Christian groups, such as Catholicism, Anglicanism, Eastern Orthodoxy and the Armenian Apostolic Church) and a few prominent church ...
*
* Recorded Texas Historic Landmarks in Cameron County
References
External links
Official Cathedral SiteRoman Catholic Diocese of Brownsville Official Site
Roman Catholic Diocese of Brownsville
Gothic Revival church buildings in Texas
Roman Catholic churches completed in 1856
Buildings and structures in Brownsville, Texas
Churches on the National Register of Historic Places in Texas
Immaculate Conception, Brownsville
Churches in Cameron County, Texas
National Register of Historic Places in Cameron County, Texas
Recorded Texas Historic Landmarks
19th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in the United States
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