Catholic diocese in Charlotte plans ‘defining moment’ to build its first cathedral

The Diocese of Charlotte unveiled plans to build a new cathedral after outgrowing the 85-year-old St. Patrick Cathedral in the Dilworth neighborhood.

Bishop Peter Jugis recently accepted the recommendation from a task force of church and lay leaders for a new cathedral, the Rev. Msgr. Patrick Winslow, local vicar general and chancellor, told The Charlotte Observer. “This is a defining moment for the Diocese of Charlotte,” Jugis told the Catholic News Herald.

While a location has not been determined yet, it will be in Charlotte. One of the locations being considered is the Diocesan Pastoral Center on South Church Street in uptown, a church official told The Charlotte Observer.

The cost of the project is unknown. But costs for cathedral construction have ranged from $31 million in Knoxville in 2018 to $190 million in Los Angeles in 2002, according to the Charlotte diocese.

After a site is found, construction would not begin until 2030 because of preliminary work needed to be doe before then, including identifying a site, getting an architect and determining the cost of the plan, Charlotte diocese officials said.

St. Patrick is one of the smallest cathedrals in the U.S. with seating for only 350 people — most places in America have between 1,000 and 3,000 spaces for worshipers or visitors.

There’s an overflow of people outside during events, Winslow said. “But those are good problems to have and we’re happy to have them. We just have to meet the challenge,” he added.

St. Patrick was built as a parish church in 1939, but it became the cathedral after the diocese was established in 1972. Cathedrals are the mother church and ceremonial seat of a diocese.

Construction for a new cathedral in Charlotte was put off for more than 50 years. “We really wanted to focus on the people, the ministry and all the works that we needed to attend to,” Winslow said.

Since then, roof and drainage work was completed to repair water damage to ceilings and walls that are aging. Parking and access to the cathedral are other problems for the landlocked site.

Winslow said a new cathedral would be the first cathedral built for the Charlotte diocese. “It can’t come too soon,” he said.

Making plans for the cathedral

Fundraising for the Charlotte cathedral is expected to start in the next few years. The goal is to have a place big enough to hold between 1,000 to 2,000 people, Winslow said.

Out of 193 Catholic cathedrals in the U.S., 15 have been built or expanded in the past several decades. Six were in the South and serve a growing population of Hispanic families coming from the Midwest and Northeast, according to the Charlotte diocese.

The task force was formed more than a year ago to advise Jugis on whether a new cathedral was needed. To emphasize the need, local diocese officials noted that Charlotte’s cathedral was not much bigger than the one in Juneau, Alaska — which has a total population of just around 32,000 people.

For big events in the Charlotte region, other parishes outside of Charlotte, such as the St. Marks Catholic Church in Huntersville are used since they can hold more than 1,000 people, Winslow said.

The task force said the cathedral should be in the city because it’s the seat of the diocese, which serves 46 counties and 540,000 people in western North Carolina.

“We are looking at all of our current assets,” Winslow said. “We want to make a wise and smart decision. One that is fiscally responsible and one that would serve the church and larger community.”

The current cathedral will continue to function as a parish church, Winslow said. It will also have a proto-cathedral designation for being the first in Charlotte.

About the Diocese of Charlotte

The Diocese of Charlotte provides services to followers and the public through 92 parishes and missions, 20 schools and more than 50 ministries.

“It seems to be the right moment to recognize as a young diocese, this is the last stone in the foundation that we need to place,” Winslow said about the cathedral project. “It’s our generation’s responsibility to meet that need.

“The previous generations have helped lay the groundwork of becoming a diocese.”

Other significant church buildings in NC

In July 2017, Raleigh’s new $46 million copper dome cathedral, the Holy Name of Jesus Cathedral, officially opened.

At the time, it was the first Catholic cathedral to open in the U.S. in decades, the (Raleigh) News & Observer reported at the time. The cathedral can seat up to 2,000 people, replacing a former parish church maintained as a cathedral that sat about 300.

And last spring, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints announced its first temple in the Charlotte region would go up in Weddington.

The one-story temple will be about 30,000 square feet, and is underway as as membership in the Mormon faith across North Carolina has been on the rise.