Philadelphia’s First Catholic Cathedral
Old St. Mary’s traces its history to 1763, when a second church was needed for the growing number of Catholics in the city. Built on land originally bought to serve as a cemetery for Old St. Joseph’s, Old St. Mary’s was referred to as “Mission Number 1” as St.
St. Peter Claver
On March 26, 1889, Archbishop Patrick Ryan wrote to Mother Katharine Drexel to inform her that he had secured a priest to minister to the Black Catholics in Philadelphia.[1] There had been a growing need for a dedicated ministry for some time. Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, Black Catholics
Starting from Scratch: The Story of Msgr. Hawks and St. Joan of Arc Parish
Msgr. Edward Hawks was born Feb 17, 1878 in Southern Wales. He moved to Canada to study for priesthood in the Anglican church. During the Open pulpit controversy, he converted to Catholicism and was ordained by Archbishop Prendergast in 1911. He served as a chaplain in the Canadian Expeditionary Force
Parish Mapping Project
Over the past few months, CHRC have been working on a parish mapping project. Taking inspiration from a similar project from the Archdiocese of Boston, we have constructed maps of what the parish boundaries used to look like over various times in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia's past. The main goal