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WELCOME! You are on a JOURNEY TO FAITH,
the Virtual Tour of the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen in
Baltimore! In these pages, you will have an enjoyable, visual
experience of our faith. And scattered throughout are pictures
splendid enough to use as desktop wallpaper for your computer.
Don't miss our secondary tour, Journey to the Heart of Mary Our Queen, a virtual Marian pilgrimage.
The Cathedral of Mary Our Queen sits as one of the
great cathedrals in the United States. It is the intention of
this Virtual Tour to not only give you a photographic journey
through our beautiful facilities, but also to provide you with
an inspirational walk through our Catholic faith.
Built over the course of five years, the Cathedral was
dedicated on November 15, 1959, by Archbishop Francis Keough. A
fitting tribute to the glory of God through the Blessed Virgin
Mary, the building is truly awesome in its size and scope.
The actual numbers themselves are staggering: The Cathedral is
373 feet long (which is 41 feet longer than Saint Patrick's
Cathedral in New York City), 132 feet wide at its typical width
and 163 feet to the top of the spires. Over 3 million bricks
were used, along with 70,000 pieces of Indiana limestone for the
interior and exterior facing. No structural steel was used for
support. The building is designed to seat 1900 people and can
fits as many as 2200. The roof reaches 90 feet into the air.
There are over 385 sculptures and 398 panels of stained glass in
the nave alone. The church building, along with the rectory,
school, physical plant, and the new Cathedral Parish Center
(behind the Cathedral), sit on 25 acres in the Homeland area of
Baltimore City.
This church is called a cathedral because it contains the
"throne" (from the Latin word, "cathedra")
of the Archbishop. The throne is one of the oldest and most
important symbols of the Church. The Cathedral serves, together
with the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Assumption of
the Blessed Virgin Mary, as one of the two centers of the
liturgical life of the Archdiocese. This makes Baltimore one of
the few dioceses in the United States with two cathedrals. The
Cathedral also serves as the center of a very active parish of
over 2,000 families.
NEXT: The catechetical design of the cathedral
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