The Church of St Augustine is a

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a place/building for Christian religious activities and praying * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian comm ...

located in La Serena,

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in western South America. It is the southernmost country in the world and the closest to Antarctica, stretching along a narrow strip of land between the Andes, Andes Mountains and the Paci ...

History

The original church dates from 1672 and was built by the

Society of Jesus The Society of Jesus (; abbreviation: S.J. or SJ), also known as the Jesuit Order or the Jesuits ( ; ), is a religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rome. It was founded in 1540 ...

. In 1680 it was set on fire by the pirate

Bartholomew Sharp Bartholomew Sharp (c. 1650 – 29 October 1702) was an English buccaneer and privateer. His career of piracy lasted seven years (1675–1682). In the Caribbean he took several ships, and raided the Gulf of Honduras and Portobelo. He took comman ...

. In 1768 the church went on to be staffed by the

Augustinians Augustinians are members of several religious orders that follow the Rule of Saint Augustine, written about 400 A.D. by Augustine of Hippo. There are two distinct types of Augustinians in Catholic religious orders dating back to the 12th–13 ...

. In 1798 the upper stage of the tower was destroyed by a storm and rebuilt the following year. The tower was later badly damaged again, this time by an earthquake in 1847, and was rebuilt by three years later. In 1903, another earthquake caused structural damage to the church. It burned down in 1912, and was rebuilt in 1913 as a three-

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...

church. In 1959 a fire destroyed the rebuilt church. It suffered severe damage from the . The more recent rebuilding of the church, led by architect Pedro Broquedis, began in 1985 and was completed in 1994, the year of the 450th anniversary of the foundation of La Serena, being officially opened on August 18, 1995 – although the masses were resumed in 1990 in the northeast portion of the church. In 2002, the

Order of Augustinian Recollects The Order of Augustinian Recollects (OAR) is a mendicant Catholic religious order of friars and nuns. It is a reformist offshoot from the Augustinians, Augustinian hermit friars and follows the same Rule of St. Augustine. They have also been kno ...

undertook the management of the church. The church is located at the intersection of Arturo Prat and Cienfuegos streets, facing . It is eclectic in style.

References

{{coord, -29.9020, -71.2466, type:landmark_region:CL, display=title La Serena, Chile Roman Catholic churches in Chile