The Church of the Immaculate Conception is a

Ukrainian Greek Catholic The Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (UGCC) is a major archiepiscopal '' sui iuris'' ("autonomous") Eastern Catholic church that is based in Ukraine. As a particular church of the Catholic Church, it is in full communion with the Holy See. ...

church located in

Cooks Creek, Manitoba Cooks Creek is an unincorporated community in the Rural Municipality of Springfield, Manitoba, Canada. The community is home to two churches, a community centre and a museum. The Immaculate Conception Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church is an intri ...

. The church was constructed from 1930 to 1938 by the

Ukrainian Canadian Ukrainian Canadians are Canadian citizens of Ukrainian descent or Ukrainian-born people who immigrated to Canada. In the late 19th century, the first Ukrainian immigrants arrived in the east coast of Canada. They were primarily farmers and l ...

priest and architect

Philip Ruh Philip Ruh, O.M.I. (born Philip Roux; ; 6 August 1883 – 24 October 1962) was Catholic priest and church architect. Although he was educated as a Belgian Oblate (Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate), he is remembered for his work in Canad ...

. It was designated a Manitoba Provincial Heritage Site in 1986 and a National Historic Site in 1997.

History

The Cook's Creek Parish of the

Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church The Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (UGCC) is a Major archiepiscopal church, major archiepiscopal ''sui iuris'' ("autonomous") Eastern Catholic Churches, Eastern Catholic church that is based in Ukraine. As a particular church of the Cathol ...

was established in 1929.

, a

Catholic priest and architect, was appointed the parish priest and tasked with designing a church that would replace two smaller churches in the area. Construction of the church began in 1930 and was finished in 1938, whereupon work on the church's interiors began. The church was consecrated in 1952. A grotto modeled after that of

Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes The Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes (; ) is a Catholic Marian shrine and pilgrimage site dedicated to Our Lady of Lourdes in the town of Lourdes, Hautes-Pyrénées, France. The sanctuary includes several religious buildings and monuments arou ...

France France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...

was constructed next to the church in 1954.

Preservation

The Church of the Immaculate Conception was named a on 1 May 1986 and then subsequently a National Historic Site on 22 September 1997. It was added to the

Canadian Register of Historic Places The Canadian Register of Historic Places (CRHP; , ), also known as Canada's Historic Places, is an online directory of historic places in Canada which have been formally recognized for their heritage value by a federal, provincial, territorial ...

on 14 July 2009.

Architecture

The Church of the Immaculate Conception was designed by Ruh in an

eclectic style Eclecticism is a kind of mixed style in the fine arts: "the borrowing of a variety of styles from different sources and combining them" . Significantly, Eclecticism hardly ever constituted a specific style in art: it is characterized by the fact t ...

combining elements from

Kievan Rus' Kievan Rus', also known as Kyivan Rus,. * was the first East Slavs, East Slavic state and later an amalgam of principalities in Eastern Europe from the late 9th to the mid-13th century.John Channon & Robert Hudson, ''Penguin Historical At ...

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

, and

Gothic architecture Gothic architecture is an architectural style that was prevalent in Europe from the late 12th to the 16th century, during the High Middle Ages, High and Late Middle Ages, surviving into the 17th and 18th centuries in some areas. It evolved f ...

. Architectural historians Basil Rotoff,

Roman Yereniuk Roman Yereniuk is an educator and former public official in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. He has been the principal of St. Andrew's College at the University of Manitoba, and was a trustee with the Winnipeg School Board from 1989 to 1995 and again ...

, and Stella Hryniuk note that the profile of the church overall resembles Kievan Rus' churches found in eastern Ukraine but is punctuated with Romanesque windows and a Gothic

portico A portico is a porch leading to the entrance of a building, or extended as a colonnade, with a roof structure over a walkway, supported by columns or enclosed by walls. This idea was widely used in ancient Greece and has influenced many cu ...

. The church was built from brick to a

cruciform A cruciform is a physical manifestation resembling a common cross or Christian cross. These include architectural shapes, biology, art, and design. Cruciform architectural plan Christian churches are commonly described as having a cruciform ...

plan, measuring . It has nine domes and

cupola In architecture, a cupola () is a relatively small, usually dome-like structure on top of a building often crowning a larger roof or dome. Cupolas often serve as a roof lantern to admit light and air or as a lookout. The word derives, via Ital ...

s above the cross's arms, flanking the arms, and above the center of the church.

References

Sources

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External links

{{Authority control Churches in Manitoba Ukrainian Catholic churches in Canada Churches completed in 1938 20th-century Eastern Catholic church buildings 20th-century churches in Canada Buildings and structures in Eastman Region, Manitoba