Cambrai Cathedral (french: Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Grâce de Cambrai) is a

Catholic 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 ...

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a building for Christian religious activities * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian communal worship * C ...

located in Cambrai, Nord, France, and is the seat of the

Archbishop of Cambrai The Archdiocese of Cambrai ( la, Archdiocesis Cameracensis; French: ''Archidiocèse de Cambrai'') is a Latin Church ecclesiastical jurisdiction or archdiocese of the Catholic Church in France, comprising the arrondissements of Avesnes-sur-Helpe ...

. The

cathedral A cathedral is a church that contains the '' cathedra'' () of a bishop, thus serving as the central church of a diocese, conference, or episcopate. Churches with the function of "cathedral" are usually specific to those Christian denominatio ...

was registered as a '' monument historique'' on 9 August 1906. It was built between 1696 and 1703, on the site of a former 11th-century building, as the church of the Abbey of Saint-Sépulcre. During the

French Revolution The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in coup of 18 Brumaire, November 1799. Many of its ...

the old cathedral of Cambrai was destroyed, but the abbey church survived because it was used instead as a Temple of Reason. When the ecclesiastical status of Cambrai was restored in 1802, albeit as a diocese rather than as an archdiocese, which it had previously been, the bishop's seat was established in the surviving abbey church, which became the cathedral of Cambrai. Cambrai was again constituted an

archbishopric In church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop. History In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided provinces were administratively associa ...

in 1841. The cathedral was severely damaged by fire in 1859, but at length restored, with advice from Viollet-le-Duc, and consecrated on 12 May 1894. It was raised to the status of a basilica minor by

Pope Leo XIII Pope Leo XIII ( it, Leone XIII; born Vincenzo Gioacchino Raffaele Luigi Pecci; 2 March 1810 – 20 July 1903) was the head of the Catholic Church from 20 February 1878 to his death in July 1903. Living until the age of 93, he was the second-old ...

on 17 March 1896.Archidiocesan website
/ref> It was also badly damaged in

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

and, not so seriously, in

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

. It contains the tomb, by David d'Anger, of François Fénelon, who was archbishop from 1696 to 1715. The Cathedral is a minor pilgrimage site because of the noted Italo-Byzantine painting known as the Cambrai Madonna or Our Lady of Cambrai (c. 1340) in a side chapel. The cathedral now takes its dedication name "Notre-Dame de Grâce" or " Virgin of Tenderness" from this painting, from the

Eleusa icon The Eleusa (or ''Eleousa''; el, Ἐλεούσα – ''tenderness'' or ''showing mercy'') is a type of depiction of the Virgin Mary in icons in which the Christ Child is nestled against her cheek. In the Western Church the type is often known as t ...

type it exemplifies. In the same chapel is a memorial erected by

Hilaire Belloc Joseph Hilaire Pierre René Belloc (, ; 27 July 187016 July 1953) was a Franco-English writer and historian of the early twentieth century. Belloc was also an orator, poet, sailor, satirist, writer of letters, soldier, and political activist. H ...

to commemorate his son who was killed nearby in the last days of World War I.

References

Sources

*Eugène Bouly, ''Histoire de Cambrai et du Cambrésis'', vol. 1, Cambrai, Hattu, Libraire-Éditeur, 1842
version
*Eugène Bouly, ''Histoire de Cambrai et du Cambrésis'', vol. 2, Cambrai, Hattu, Libraire-Éditeur, 1842
version
*Jules Houdoy, ''Histoire artistique de la cathédrale de Cambrai'', Paris: D. Morgand and C. Fatout, 1880
version
*Louis Trenard (dir.) and Charles Pietri, ''Histoire des Pays-Bas Français'', Édouard Privat, coll. "Univers de la France et des Pays francophones / Histoire des Provinces", 1974 (1st ed. 1974) *Louis Trenard (dir.) and Michel Rouche (preface by Jacques Legendre), ''Histoire de Cambrai'', vol. 2, Presses Universitaires de Lille, coll. "Histoire des villes du Nord / Pas-de-Calais", 1982 (1st ed. 1982), 314 p. *Michel Dussart (dir.), ''Mémoire de Cambrai'', Cambrai, Société d'Emulation de Cambrai, 2004, 220 p. *''Revue du Nord'', Louis Trenard (dir.), Université de Lille III, Villeneuve d'Ascq, Tome LVIII no 230, numéro spécial "Cambrai et le Cambrésis", juillet-septembre 1976 *Henri Jenny, ''Cathédrale de Cambrai: l'abbaye du Saint-Sépulcre'', Cambrai, Mallez impr., 1970, 48 p.

External links

LocationArchives of Ontario
{{Authority control Roman Catholic churches completed in 1703 Cambrai Churches in Nord (French department) Basilica churches in France Cambrai 18th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in France