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St. Vincent de Paul Chapel

Construction of the present Cardinal Rigali Center began in 1913, and the building was dedicated in 1916 as the home of Kenrick Seminary.  Kenrick was chartered by the state as the Saint Louis Roman Catholic Theological Seminary in 1898, two years after the death of Peter Kenrick, second bishop and first archbishop of St. Louis, who had served for more than fifty years, still a record.  After purchasing and then selling the present site of the St. Louis County Club in Ladue, Cardinal Glennon bought 373 acres of the old Mackenzie Tract, stretching east from Laclede Station Road to Mackenzie Road, an area more than twice the size of Carondelet Park.  Although much of this land has been sold for development in recent decades, Catholic institutions including the Rigali Center, the present Kenrick-Glennon Seminary, and Our Lady of Life still occupy over 100 acres.

To design of the new building, the seminary brought from Pittsburgh John T. Comes (c. 1873-1922).  A nationally recognized leader in the design and decoration of Catholic churches, Comes (the name rhymes with “Gomez”) was born in Luxembourg and raised in Minnesota.  He settled in Pittsburgh in 1897, and his work is concentrated in western Pennsylvania, but he also worked in New York, Ohio, Minnesota, and as far west as Utah.  Kenrick was his only work in Missouri but one of his most widely admired, the subject of a long article in The Ecclesiastical Review in June 1913, even before it was completed, illustrated in American Architect in 1916, and in Comes’ own book, Catholic Art and Architecture in 1920.  Comes formed an association here with Thomas F. Imbs (1885-1959), a St. Louis native who had graduated in 1910 from the University of Pennsylvania.  Imbs’ modest later career included Epiphany Catholic Church at Smiley and Ivanhoe.Comes wrote that Kenrick was “rendered in a free collegiate manner without the elaborate pinnacles and ornaments of its prototypes.” The term “collegiate” refers to the Collegiate Gothic style already seen here in Washington University’s Hilltop Campus, but also more specifically to the organization of the chapel with the pews facing each other, as in the college chapels at Oxford and Cambridge, and before that to the choir ends of cathedrals, where sat the administering body, the college of canons.  With its arcades and side aisles, Kenrick’s chapel is like the chancel area of a cathedral, down to the choir screen with its arch.  Comes designed the screens separating the choir stalls or seats from the aisles with stations of the cross centered in each section.  Students sat in the four rows of pews in order of their theological class.

The Latin inscription on the entrance arch identifies the space as a chapel in honor of St. Vincent de Paul, founder in 1626 of the Congregation of the Mission, known as the Vincentians.  In 1818 they became the first Catholic men’s order to serve St. Louis.  Vincentians staffed Kenrick from its beginning until 1987, when it moved to nearby Cardinal Glennon College.  St. Vincent (1580-1660) appears as one of the six carved saints with Christ the King on the reredos above the main altar.  The two painted panels below depict Saint Peter.  The wooden statues on each side of the entrance arch represent Pope Saints Pius X and Gregory the Great.  Another remarkable sculpture is the monumental crucifixion group that stands on the so-called Rood Beam which crosses the chapel high above the sanctuary, a medieval feature seldom seen in this country.

The consistent look the chapel now displays took many years to achieve.  The dazzling window over the main altar, featuring symbols of the Apostles, was completed at the same time as building, but the 18 side windows were created by Emil Frei Art Glass between 1922 and 1929, with the last window on the left contributed by Century Ornamental Glass.  The windows are paired to represent aspects of priesthood, with Old Testament examples on the right or north side and New Testament ones on the left.  Several depict Moses, identifiable by the rays of light radiating from his head, including scenes of the burning bush, the crossing of the Red Sea, the brazen serpent, and Passover.  New Testament scenes include the Sermon on the Mount, the Transfiguration, and the multiplication of loaves and fishes.  Grisaille or gray glass was installed in the clerestory windows in the 1950s.

Only one of the twelve planned side chapels, called oratories, was completed at the start, the rest being added in the 1950s under the direction of architect Raymond E. Maritz.  They are dedicated to eleven disciples and St. Paul, who are depicted in altar paintings by Raymond L. Matteuzzi and represented by symbols on the altars.  The coats of arms seen around the room represent bishops of this archdiocese as well as many students and faculty members who subsequently became bishops.  The series was started by Monsignor Ernest J. Blankemeier (class of 1915) and is continued today by the Kenrick Alumni Association.

February 22, 2009 marks the Saint Louis Chamber Chorus’ first performance here.