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St. Colman’s Cathedral, Cobh, Co. Cork
Praxiteles has been busy reding through the enormous bundle of material jack-hammared from the public service on the present condition of Cobh Cathedral. The exercise has been useful: it has confirmed waht the FOSCC has been saying for at least three years (Cobh Cathedral is in serious decay and needs immeidate attention); and that the building is in the hands of ignorant incompetent people who have no realization of the importance of the building of which they are supposed to be stewards.
We now know that the cause of the collapse of the masonary from the south arcade is water ingress which is caused by the defective functioning of the exterior envelope of the building. Those defects are, in almost all cases, due to defective work carried out in the so-called restoration work of the 1990s. In fact, these restoration works -which cost Euro 4.5 million – have caused more problems with consequent decay to the fabric of the building than had occurred sine Cobh Cathedral was build between 1868 and 1919. It is unconscienable that the pointing works carried out the south facade in the 1990s have resulted in the rapid decay of the internal Bath stone. Suffiece it to say that 2 kilos of dust from the Bath stone fell into the protective nets now hanging from the south clerstory between March and September 2008.
The second major source of problems giving rise to water ingress is LAZINESS. It appears that noticeable damage has been caused to the internal fabric of the Cathedral (including some of Oppenheimer’s opus sectile shrines) due to water ingress deriving from blocked down-water goods. The idiots in charge of the place did/do not know that gutter pipes have to be cleaned at least twice a year. The result here is that wtare just streams down the walls and into the non-pointed limestone joints and eventually end as salt causing the mosaics on the walls to lift or as dust in safety nets.
A thrid problem derives from rising dampness -although not very extensive – again due to laziness because the people in charge did/do not know that a blocked drain should be freed and that the underground drains should be kept clear so as to insure that water will not lodge in the artificial platform on which the building is constructed.
St, Colman’s Cathedral, Cobh Co. Cork.
Recently, Praxiteles received an extraordinary bundle of documentation which was wrenched from the public service by means of a Freedom of Information Request to which response had to be made despite a certain reluctance in the same service to “share” information with the publich which continues to pay these people even in critical economic times. It makes for highly interesting reading and Praxiteles hpoes to Share some fot eh costlier nuggets with readers over the coming weeks.
Firstly, we now know for certain that the collapse of the Bath sheeting on the south arcade was inceed cause by water ingress not only form the roof .which was defectively installed during the 1990s reatoration- but also from the the external walls. Praxiteles believed that the pointing on the South facade had been incompenently done during the restoration works in the 1990s. Praxiteles now reads that this was not the case. Instead, it turns out that having grotted out the original pointing to the limestone courses on the south facade IT WAS NOT REPLACED AT ALL. Can you imagine that!
Read for yourself:
“Although it was initially felt that the heating system was causing the decay (of the Bath stone), due to condensation, the infra-red syrvey showed that this was not the case. This lead to an examination of the external stone fabric and it was discovered thatthe fine joints of the limestone were not repointed during restoration works carried out in the 1990s. It is now thought that the water ingress through these fine limestone joints could be the cause of the internal stone decay”.
@pandaz7 wrote:
Must say I love this “formal entry” with the big cloak and some lackey getting to carry the train!! How humble. I seem to remember something from my schooldays about Jesus entering Jerusalem on a donkey. [/B] This boyo is obviously quite a VIP!
Stable theology?
St. Colman’s Cathedral, Cobh, Co. Cork
Finally, the “restoration” steering committee have returned their accounts (late) for the fiscal year of 2008. As you will notice, the accounts are dated 28 May – a full two months after the chairman vacated the government of the diocese of Cloyne.
After the resignations of two very reliable Vicars General (o’callaghan and o’donnell) and the death of another member, this depleted committee now consists of the following:
Bishop John Magee, Denis Murphy, Frank Walley, Brian Carroll, and Robin Morrissey.
From the accounts it would appear that we have one million euro in the bank at 31 december 2008.
Interestingly, Euro 40,000 was obtauined from the Heritage Council to do the fanmous survey conducted by TKB SOuthgate etc. which, from other lines in the accounts, would appear to have cost about Euro 58,000.
Watch this space.
For anyone looking for a cheer-up and a good laugh in the midst of the November dreariness, Praxitelex shares the following which was published on http://verbumpatris.wordpress.com/ .
The national Centre for Liturgy in Association with the Advisory Committee on Sacred Art and Architecture will hold a day long conference for architects and artists and people interested and involved in places of worship on Saturday November 28th, in the Renehan Hall, St. Patrick’s College Maynooth from 11 until 4. Registration €25 through the national centre for Liturgy, St. Patrick’s College, 01- 7083478
Once again, it sounds like Chateaubriand’s description of Talleyrand and Fouché, la vision infernale… le vice appuyé sur le bras du crime.
“Ensuite, je me rendis chez Sa Majesté : introduit dans une des chambres qui précédaient celle du roi, je ne trouvai personne ; je m’assis dans un coin et j’attendis. Tout à coup une porte s’ouvre: entre silencieusement le vice appuyé sur le bras du crime, M. de Talleyrand marchant soutenu par M. Fouché ; la vision infernale passe lentement devant moi, pénètre dans le cabinet du roi et disparaît. Fouché venait jurer foi et hommage à son seigneur ; le féal régicide, à genoux, mît les mains qui firent tomber la tête de Louis XVI entre les mains du frère du roi martyr ; l’évêque apostat fut caution du serment.
Chateaubriand, Mémoires d’Outre-tombe”
St Colman’s cathedral, Cobh, Co. Cork.
Two video clips showed up recently on Gloria.TV of the Solemn High Mass celebrated in Cobh cathedral last July in the presence of George Cardinal pell, Archbishop of Sydney. While they do not ahve sound, they do well illustrate how the sanctuary in Cobh should function – especially when the throne is occupied:
The formal entry of a Cardinal:
http://it.gloria.tv/?media=38513
and
The incensation of the Altar at the beginning of Mass
The Basilica of Notre Dame, Montréal (1823-1829) by James O’Donnell
In 1657, the Roman Catholic Sulpician Order arrived in Ville-Marie, now known as Montreal; six years later the seigneury of the island was vested in them. They ruled until 1840. The parish they founded was dedicated to the Holy Name of Mary, and the parish church of Notre-Dame was built on the site in 1672.
By 1824 the congregation had completely outgrown the church, and James O’Donnell, an Irish-American Protestant from New York, was commissioned to design the new building. O’Donnell was a proponent of the Gothic Revival architectural movement, and designed the church as such. He is the only person buried in the church’s crypt. O’Donnell converted to Catholicism on his deathbed perhaps due to the realization that he might not be allowed to be buried in his church.
The sanctuary was finished in 1830, and the first tower in 1843. On its completion, the church was the largest in North America.
The interior took much longer, and Victor Bourgeau, who also worked on Montreal’s Mary, Queen of the World Cathedral, worked on it from 1872 to 1879. Stonemason John Redpath was a major participant in the construction of the Basilica.
Because of the splendour and grand scale of the church, a more intimate chapel, Chapelle du Sacré-Coeur (Chapel of the Sacred Heart), was built behind it, along with some offices and a sacristy. It was completed in 1888.
The High Altar
Example of the polychrome stencils:
The church of St Joseph at Beauce, Quebec (1865-1868) built for Fr. James Nelligan by Francois and Louis Dion
And here, the restored catafalque which was re-used for the first time since 1938 on 7 November 2009:
In addition, the church also possesses a second catafalque for the obsequese of a child:
Apelles!
Here is the best I can do with the ceiling of the chancel in Sts Peter and Paul’s. There is reason to believe that the scheme, dating from the late 1860s/early 1870s, is by Hodkinson’s (now) of Limerick.
St. Peter and Paul’s, Cork City
An interesting photograph of the church functioning as it was built to function and following the recent “re-reordering” of the sanctuary to restore it to what it was before the outbreak started.
The Capel of the Ursuline Convent in Quebec City with a tripartite serliana altar piece insatlled by Pierre-Noel Levasseur between 1730 and 1736 -which is regarded as the only surviving example of its kind in Canada.
The Tabernacle of the High Altar by Pierre-Noel Levasseur:
St Jean (1734 and 1852) Ile d’Orleans, Quebec
Another example of aclassical facade similar to tat of St John the Baptist, Kinsale.
The church of St-Francois-de-Salles, Neuville, Quebec (1854 but inocrporating elements from an ealier churche 1761-1773 and an amazing baldachino dating from 1695 the prototype for which is to be found in teh Bal-de-Grace in Paris). The rebuilt nave was accomplished by the school of Baillairgé.
It is perhaps worth noting the similarities between this facade and that of St JOhn the Baptist in Kinsale, Co. Cork, the work of Brother Michael Augustine Riordan dating from 10 years earlier.
The famous baldacchino:
And its prototype in the Val-de-Grace in paris which was begun in 1645:
