The Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception 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 ...

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 denomination ...

Memphis, Tennessee Memphis is a city in the U.S. state of Tennessee. It is the seat of Shelby County in the southwest part of the state; it is situated along the Mississippi River. With a population of 633,104 at the 2020 U.S. census, Memphis is the second-mos ...

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 seat of the

Diocese of Memphis 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 associat ...

. The parish buildings are

contributing properties In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing property or contributing resource is any building, object, or structure which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic distri ...

in the Central Gardens Historic District. It 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 v ...

in 1982.

History

Immaculate Conception Parish

Immaculate Conception parish was established by Bishop

Thomas Sebastian Byrne Thomas Sebastian Byrne (July 28, 1841 – September 4, 1923) was an American prelate of the Catholic Church. He served as bishop of the Diocese of Nashville in Tennessee from 1894 until his death in 1923. Biography Early life Thomas Byrne ...

of the Diocese of Nashville in 1921. It was the ninth parish in Memphis. Msgr. Dennis J. Murphy was appointed as the parish's first pastor. He built a three-story brick building that served as a combination church and school. It continues to serve the parish today as its school building. The

Sisters of Mercy The Sisters of Mercy is a religious institute of Catholic women founded in 1831 in Dublin, Ireland, by Catherine McAuley. As of 2019, the institute had about 6200 sisters worldwide, organized into a number of independent congregations. They a ...

made up the school's first faculty. Construction of the present church building was begun in 1927. Richard J. Regan of Regan and Weller Architects was chosen to design the church. The lower crypt was initially built and used as the church for ten years before the upper church was built. The church was dedicated on July 31, 1938. The parish's second pastor, Msgr. Francis D. Grady, had the decorative design work completed on the church's interior. Msgr. Merlin F. Kearney had the high school buildings east of the church built in the 1950s and 1960s. Immaculate Conception High School for girls was also begun at this time.

Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception

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 Memphis on January 6, 1971. Immaculate Conception was named as the new diocese's cathedral. A major renovation of the cathedral was completed in 2001 and was dedicated by Bishop J. Terry Steib,

SVD ''Svenska Dagbladet'' (, "The Swedish Daily News"), abbreviated SvD, is a daily newspaper published in Stockholm, Sweden. History and profile The first issue of ''Svenska Dagbladet'' appeared on 18 December 1884. During the beginning of the ...

on December 8 of that year. In 2011 there were 800 families in the parish and 430 students in the school

Architecture

The cathedral is a

Spanish Colonial Revival The Spanish Colonial Revival Style ( es, Arquitectura neocolonial española) is an architectural stylistic movement arising in the early 20th century based on the Spanish Colonial architecture of the Spanish colonization of the Americas. In the ...

style structure. It is cruciform in shape, and measures . The steel structure is covered with buff brick trimmed with

Indiana limestone Indiana limestone — also known as Bedford limestone in the building trade — has long been an economically important building material, particularly for monumental public structures. Indiana limestone is a more common term for Salem Limestone, ...

. The main facade features three round arch entrance portals, a

rose window Rose window is often used as a generic term applied to a circular window, but is especially used for those found in Gothic cathedrals and churches. The windows are divided into segments by stone mullions and tracery. The term ''rose window'' w ...

, and a stone cross on the central

pediment Pediments are gables, usually of a triangular shape. Pediments are placed above the horizontal structure of the lintel, or entablature, if supported by columns. Pediments can contain an overdoor and are usually topped by hood moulds. A pedimen ...

. Two towers flank the main facade. They are capped with copper covered domes surmounted with a cross that reach to a height of . There are two other rose windows, one in each

transept A transept (with two semitransepts) is a transverse part of any building, which lies across the main body of the building. In cruciform churches, a transept is an area set crosswise to the nave in a cruciform ("cross-shaped") building withi ...

References

External links