Historic church that survived Halifax explosion closes its doors

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At Saint Patrick’s Church, the parish legend was always that the Halifax Explosion of 1917 blew out the stained glass windows, but only on the north side.

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This was due to geography, as the blast ripped uphill through what is now the North End, destroying buildings, killing hundreds, and hitting the church broadside on the north, then barrelling onwards toward downtown where, as church historian Blair Beed jokes, it finally gave the Citadel a chance to defend something: the South End.

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Among the Irish poor whose grandparents built the church in 1883 rather than trudge downtown to the cathedral, a hike that took them indecently past taverns and brothels, the legend was handed down that the north side took the brunt of explosion and spared the south.

Greater love hath no church window than this, that a north side window lay down its life for a south.

The idea caught on with all the power of an urban legend. You can see why, literally. The proof was right there in the windows, stained ornately into glass. Under the scene of John baptizing Jesus, for example, it says “IN MEMORY OF JUBILEE 1901.” Another, on the south side of the altar, reads “ALTAR SOCIETY. A.D. 1900.”

But this catchy legend does not withstand closer scrutiny. Think about it. The Halifax Explosion was the largest human-made explosion to date. On a December morning in the middle of the Great War, a cargo ship full of high explosives accidentally detonated all at once, and it happened out in the harbour not two kilometres away. All the windows were damaged. It broke windows 100 kilometres away in Truro, for goodness sake. They heard it in Prince Edward Island. Resilient as St. Patrick’s is, even a century on, windows cannot withstand that sort of physical assault. But legends die hard.

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This year is the first Christmas since the Halifax explosion that there won’t be a Mass at St. Patrick’s.

There is no decorated tree inside, no flowers, no children’s pageant. The grand Casavant Frères organ — built in 1898 as Opus 91 by the Saint-Hyacinthe, Que., organ makers, then restored after the Explosion as Opus 766 — will not play Adeste Fideles or Angels We Have Heard On High.

The church has been fenced up by the city due to structural risk from the steeple, which needs repairs. Due to a decision by the Archdiocese of Halifax-Yarmouth to merge the parish with four others, which parishioners are contesting, it might never open as a church again.

That is why St. Patrick’s nativity scene is this year’s offering in the National Post’s Christmas tradition of a stained glass window on the front page.

Over the years there have been windows by prominent artists such as Guido Nincheri and Leo Mol. There has been an Inuit nativity with Mary and Joseph in parkas and the infant in caribou fur; a Rocky Mountain and Prairie scene with the baby lying on wheat, watched over by moose and deer beside the Bow River; and one reconstituted entirely of shards from windows of European churches wrecked by war.

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This is the first one from an empty church.

So what happened with the windows at St. Patrick’s? Why do they have dates from before the explosion? The answer, the truth behind the legend, is that they remade the windows exactly as they were, misleading dates and all.

The priest at the time ordered them from Mayer and Co. in Munich, at the time the leading church glassmaker in the Catholic world. They came by ship from Belgium and were installed in 1922. So today they are more than a century old, and arguably the finest in the city, but due to the Explosion, they are not original.

Beed, the church historian, confirmed this for himself by getting in touch with Mayer and Co., which told him its Munich archives were destroyed in the Second World War but they still had records in New York. Apparently there had been some institutional confusion about why the priest ordered the exact same windows again.

This year, on the south side especially (maritime weather permitting) Christmas morning sunlight will illuminate these windows, but it will land on empty pews.

The Archdiocese told parishioners earlier this year that the church is to be removed from sacred duty and its congregation merged with other parishes. This was because of the cost of repair and restoration, which would require provincial government approval, but also wider concerns such as finances, attendance and pastoral capacity. Soon after, the city issued an emergency building closure for concerns about the structural integrity of the steeple.

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The fences went up abruptly, and prevented a planned final Mass, so parishioners held a service in the parking lot.

The next day, against the letter if not the spirit of the order, Beed went in to clean the fridges, turn off the hot water tank, and do all the physical property things to keep a beloved building safe in the absence of its people.

He sat and said his prayers and consumed the unused host in the tabernacle. “And I blew out the sanctuary candle,” he said. “I locked it up and it’s all still in place. We could have Mass tomorrow.”

But they won’t. Technically, ironically, tragically, comically, it would be trespassing. Perhaps it’s a comfort just to know that they could. Beed has the keys.

When he last spoke with National Post, Beed had not decided his Christmas plans, not for lack of festive options, but because there’s really only one place he needs to be, and he can’t.

“I may be sitting outside of Saint Patrick’s church saying Merry Christmas,” he said.

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