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ATLANTA—The Jubilee Year has been a time of special
celebration at the Cathedral of Christ the King where parishioners and staff
have been reaping the benefits of a major renovation project that provided a
new parish center and a multilevel parking deck.
The $11.5 million project, which included construction of a
three-story parish center nestled between the Cathedral and Christ the King
School, and a new parking deck facing the Cathedral on Peachtree Way, was
dedicated May 26 by Archbishop John F. Donoghue.
The new parish center was built of Indiana limestone to match the
stone of the Cathedral. The new structure provides a large gathering area, a
parish hall and kitchen for conferences and social events, a floor devoted to
parish offices and a floor to serve Christ the King School. The 350-car parking
deck has replaced the existing parking lot at the corner of Peachtree Road and
Peachtree Way.
“I think we have the prettiest parking deck in the
city,” said Margaret Jones, the stewardship director for the parish.
Jones, who lives near the Cathedral, said that she knows, as a
neighbor, that the new parking deck also pleases those who live along Peachtree
Way, which used to be lined with cars on Sundays during Mass and for special
archdiocesan events. In addition to access on Peachtree Way, the parking deck
is accessible from Peachtree Road, but only the top level is visible from
Atlanta’s landmark street because of the rise of the land. Landscaping
further buffers the deck from the neighborhood.
Designed by architects Surber, Barber, Choate & Hertlein of
Atlanta and built by Atlanta contractor H.C. Beck, the top floor of the new
parish center joins the Cathedral at the level of the church interior. New
double doors were cut in the east wall of the Cathedral leading to and from a
new spacious gathering area and lobby. New confessionals are located in this
area.
The lobby also provides access into the parish hall, which doubles
the capacity of the existing Hyland Center, and a new kitchen. A new doorway
from the narthex of the Cathedral leads to the parish center via a covered
walkway.
“We have never had the opportunity as a parish to gather
after Mass, because we haven’t had the space,” Jones said.
“We’ve been having welcoming coffees after Mass in the parish center.
It’s been wonderful.”
A grand staircase descends from this level to the middle floor of
the new parish center, which has offices for the parish staff and
administrators, many of whom formerly worked in the rectory of the Cathedral.
This level is connected to the existing office and meeting areas in the lower
level of the Cathedral and to the rectory, which is now a priests residence
only. This level also includes three nurseries for children and has an entrance
on Peachtree Way.
“Moving to the new building means that (the offices) are
together for the first time,” Jones said. “It’s wonderful.”
The lowest level of the new parish center connects with Christ the
King School at the level of the old school parking lot. This floor provides a
new school library/media center and three new classrooms.
These classrooms have also benefited the parish school of
religion, according to Anne Boshinski, director of family and children’s
ministry for the parish. She said that she is grateful to Msgr. Thomas Kenny,
Cathedral rector, for his vision of religious education.
“Msgr. (Kenny) is very interested in the catechesis of all
children,” she said. “(The new space) shows that we are thought of as
important and that Msgr. Kenny is really concerned with religious education at
the parish.”
The new space now provides a resource room for catechists and a
catechist volunteer workroom. There are nearly 450 students, from age three to
eighth-graders, in the parish school of religion. Twenty-two class sessions
consecutively take place on Sundays.
“It’s exciting because you just see the church of
tomorrow growing,” Boshinski said.
Another ministry that has benefited from the new building is the
Hispanic ministry at the parish.
Hispanic children in the parish now participate in their own
Liturgy of the Word in the parish center, while attending the Spanish Mass with
their parents at 1:30 p.m. on Sundays. The children hear the readings in
Spanish in simplified terms in the parish center and return to the Mass
following the homily.
Following that Mass, the Hispanic community gathers in the parish
center for fellowship and hospitality. Father Fabio Sotelo-Peña,
parochial vicar at the Cathedral, said that the additional space gives members
of the community a chance to get to know one another and provides social
opportunities, such as job networking and leads for those searching for
apartments and homes.
“It has been a blessing now to have a place to gather and
celebrate not only our faith but our culture as well,” Father
Sotelo-Peña said. “It helps us to develop a sense of community and
a sense of being a family. Before, people just came to Mass and left. Now they
get to know others and they feel welcome.”
Father Sotelo-Peña also hears confessions in Spanish on
Sundays from 11:30 a.m. to 12:45 p.m.
Ham Smith, director of music ministry at the Cathedral, said that
the new structures and renovations exceeded expectations.
“The facilities turned out to be as beautiful and as elegant
as we had hoped,” he said. “The planning was well worth it. Everyone
is so pleased.”
Smith said that the project “represents a major effort by
everyone, whether they gave one dollar or $1 million dollars” and that
parishioners are proud of their accomplishments.
“I’ve been (at the Cathedral) for 37 years and there is
a new and palpable and enthusiastic sense of community,” he said.
“It’s almost a spiritual feeling of accomplishment like now we can
really do the Lord’s work. It’s really energized the place.”
In his homily at the Mass of dedication, Archbishop Donoghue spoke
of the time over 60 years ago, in 1939, when the Cathedral was consecrated. At
that time “so few Catholics lived in North Georgia,” he pointed out,
that Atlanta was simply a part of the older Diocese of Savannah and Savannah
Bishop Gerald O’Hara “had extended a generous hand of support to the
Catholics of this city” to help them build the church.
“It was also a time, when the land upon which this proud
edifice was to sit, could be purchased, complete with its own Greek revival
mansion, for the sum of $35,000,” he said. “Like the name of the
great book, whose popularity was sweeping across the world in those very years,
those times, of few Catholics and of cheap land in Buckhead, are truly
‘gone with the wind.’”
However, “the presence of a maturing Catholic community, and
the presence of the Church’s institutions and her formidable power to
create good in society,” would be part of the new South that was coming,
he said.
After recounting some of the history of the Cathedral, the
archbishop said that although the physical attributes of the Cathedral are
beautiful, it is the people who have added the most to the building. Through
ordinary and extraordinary lives, the Cathedral has witnessed sacramental
events of family life, majestic ceremonies welcoming bishops and archbishops of
the Church, and somber yet triumphant leave-takings. “Music glorifying God
and the confident prayer of the people” have filled the structure for six
decades, he said.
“For 60 years this life of the Church has rolled on, through
us, over us, and beyond us, carrying in the force of its wake, our history, as
page by page, our lives have passed on, and our legacies written in the
invisible yet palpable spirit which indwells this edifice,” he said.
“And now, with scrupulous fidelity to the character of its architecture,
and of the precious materials with which it is adorned, the people of God of
Christ the King Parish have risen to a great challenge—the challenge of
accommodating the present, without disturbing the past—the challenge of
marrying the new with the old, as what was the new Cathedral has now become,
the newer Cathedral.”
The archbishop then expressed his joy in witnessing the commitment
and dedication of the people of the parish.
“No bishop could be happier than I am, and no happiness of
mine could be more reflective of the joy of his flock, than what I feel today,
as you join me in blessing, celebrating and enjoying together, God’s
Church the way God intended it to be, and a home for the heart of His
people—a force of love moving into the future, carrying with it all the
merit and valor of the past, and formed by the dedication of the present
generation, united in faith by the power of the Holy Spirit.” |
