St Ann's Church is a

Roman Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

located along the northern portion of

Aruba Aruba ( , , ), officially the Country of Aruba ( nl, Land Aruba; pap, Pais Aruba) is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands physically located in the mid-south of the Caribbean Sea, about north of the Venezuela peninsula of ...

island within the Catholic Diocese of Willemstad. Although rebuilt several times, the church traces its history back to 1776. It temporarily closed for repairs due to damage in 2011 and has since reopened.

Description

The original church on this site was begun in 1776 after the Chapel of Alto Vista fell into disuse and dedicated to

Saint Ann According to Christian apocryphal and Islamic tradition, Saint Anne was the mother of Mary and the maternal grandmother of Jesus. Mary's mother is not named in the canonical gospels. In writing, Anne's name and that of her husband Joachim come ...

, the mother of the

Virgin Mary Mary; arc, ܡܪܝܡ, translit=Mariam; ar, مريم, translit=Maryam; grc, Μαρία, translit=María; la, Maria; cop, Ⲙⲁⲣⲓⲁ, translit=Maria was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Joseph and the mother o ...

. When it was constructed in 1776, Santa Ana Church represented the island's second most important religious meeting place (the first being

Alto Vista Chapel Alto Vista Chapel is a small Catholic chapel also known as "Pilgrims Church" that stands on the hills above the north shore of the sea and to the northeast of the town of Noord, on the island of Aruba, 27 km north of the coast of Venezuela. T ...

). The church was rebuilt two times, once in 1831 and again in 1886. The Church was constructed between 1914 and 1919. The carved oak retable in the Saint Ann is a fine example of

neo-Gothic 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 ...

sculpture. It was created in 1870 by Hendrik van der Geld. They originated in the Netherlands, in the province of North-Brabant, but were later placed in the Antonius church in Scheveningen. When the Antonius Church was renovated in 1928, the parish priest donated the altar, the

communion rail The altar rail (also known as a communion rail or chancel rail) is a low barrier, sometimes ornate and usually made of stone, wood or metal in some combination, delimiting the chancel or the sanctuary and altar in a church, from the nave and oth ...

and

pulpit A pulpit is a raised stand for preachers in a Christian church. The origin of the word is the Latin ''pulpitum'' (platform or staging). The traditional pulpit is raised well above the surrounding floor for audibility and visibility, access ...

to the Netherlands Antilles mission which sent it to Saint Ann. It is noted that the

retable A retable is a structure or element placed either on or immediately behind and above the altar or communion table of a church. At the minimum it may be a simple shelf for candles behind an altar, but it can also be a large and elaborate structur ...

, the communion rail and pulpit won a prize at the

first Vatican Council The First Ecumenical Council of the Vatican, commonly known as the First Vatican Council or Vatican I was convoked by Pope Pius IX on 29 June 1868, after a period of planning and preparation that began on 6 December 1864. This, the twentieth ecu ...

held in

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus (legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

in 1870. A final renovation to this historical site was accomplished in 1916 (somewhere between 1919 and 1919). The most recent renovation took place in 2002.

Damage

On 25 August 2011, a severe downdraft caused damage to Saint Ann's roof and other areas. The altar, the communion rail and pulpit and remained unharmed although the roof was ripped open by the strong winds. St. Ann's continued to offer mass under a tent in their parking lot until the roof was replaced.

References

External links

Photo Gallery of Damage
{{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Ann's Church, Aruba Catholic Church in Aruba Roman Catholic churches completed in 1919 Buildings and structures in Noord Roman Catholic churches in Aruba 20th-century Roman Catholic church buildings 20th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in the Netherlands