The Sacred Heart Parish Complex is historic former Roman Catholic church complex located at 321 S. Broadway in Lawrence, Massachusetts. It consists of five buildings built between 1899 and 1936, including a fine Gothic Revival stone church. A historic district encompassing the complex was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...

on November 29, 2011. The complex was sold by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston in 2004 in order to help pay for the liabilities related to the sex abuse scandal, payouts for the scandal so far is approximately $4,000,000,000 (4 billion) church wide.

Description and history

The Sacred Heart complex is located in South Lawrence, on the west side of South Broadway, the major north-south artery through the area. It covers about between Groton and Hawley Streets, occupying all but the western part of a complete city block. The complex includes five buildings: two schools (one Romanesque Revival built 1899, the other Colonial Revival built 1926), and a convent (1920), rectory (1924), and church (1935–36). The church was designed by

Woonsocket, Rhode Island Woonsocket ( ), is a city in Providence County, Rhode Island, United States. The population was 43,240 at the 2020 census, making it the sixth largest city in the state. Being Rhode Island's northernmost city, Woonsocket lies directly south of ...

architect

Walter F. Fontaine Walter F. Fontaine (January 12, 1871 – September 21, 1938) was an American architect of French Heritage from Woonsocket, Rhode Island. Early life Fontaine was born in Fitchburg, Massachusetts in 1871 to parents that had moved there fr ...

in association with Joseph G. Morissette of Lawrence. The schools and rectory are built out of brick, while the convent is stuccoed on the exterior, and the church is an elaborate example of Gothic Revival architecture in multicolored ashlar granite. Between the 1899 school and the convent is a small grotto that is also part of the complex. In 2004 the Catholic church consolidated seven parishes in Lawrence down to three, and this complex was sold to Sagrado Corazon LLC. The schools and convent have been converted to residential use, while the church and rectory are leased to a

sedevacantist Sedevacantism ( la, Sedevacantismus) is a doctrinal position within traditionalist Catholicism, which holds that the present occupier of the Holy See is not a valid pope due to the pope's espousal of one or more heresies and that therefore, fo ...

Traditionalist Catholic Traditionalist Catholicism is the set of beliefs, practices, customs, traditions, liturgical forms, devotions, and presentations of Catholic teaching that existed in the Catholic Church before the liberal reforms of the Second Vatican Council ( ...

Dominican order. The complex as of 2017 is a vibrant traditional Catholic community. Restoration of the Church and rectory is on-going and a new brick cloister garden area has recently been built.

References

{{National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts National Register of Historic Places in Lawrence, Massachusetts Historic districts on the National Register of Historic Places in Massachusetts

Description and history

See also

References