St. Paul cathedral and Minneapolis basilica are different, but linked by more than just faith

When the Easter bells ring Sunday, they will include sounds from two of the most impressive religious structures in Minnesota — the Cathedral of St. Paul and the Basilica of St. Mary in Minneapolis.

The two Roman Catholic churches differ in design, size and location, but they are linked together as co-cathedrals of the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis.

But what else sets them apart? And what else binds them together?

Construction began for the cathedral in 1906, and was finished in 1915. Ground was broken for the basilica in 1907, and completed a year earlier in 1914.

The style for both is taken from the Renaissance, with some differences. The St. Paul Cathedral is High Renaissance, the style of sober glories that Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci would find familiar. The Basilica of St. Mary is a bit more Baroque — more ornate and effusive, but not as enthusiastically riotous as true European Baroque. It was intended for Minnesotans, after all. The both have a copper dome, except that the one at the St. Paul church is bigger than the one in Minneapolis.

The St. Paul Cathedral has a Greek cross plan. Think of a plus sign, with each of the four segments representing one of the four gospels. The Basilica of St. Mary has the Latin cross plan, which is more common in the United States. It has a long area for seating, called the nave, and a short arm, or transept, bisecting toward the top.

The different styles produce a different impression from the outside: The cathedral impresses the viewer with its broad, wide mass, while the basilica takes its strength from its length.

Both were built by Emmanuel Louis Masqueray, who studied at Paris’ renowned École des Beaux-Arts. A Frenchman by birth, he popularized the classically inspired Beaux Arts style in America and designed homes for the upper crust, including the Vanderbilts. His designs for the St. Louis World’s Fair of 1904 reprised the classical styles of the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago, awed for its beauty and power. Masqueray died in St. Paul in 1917 at age 55.

Instantaneous time-travel. In both cases you’re whisked back to 16th-century Christian tradition as expressed in architecture, sculpture, painting and music — if someone’s at the organ.

A Renaissance architect, if transported to the cathedral or basilica, might be pleased to note how the styles of his era were so beloved that they were used centuries hence.

Each building has its own collection of statuary, including a reproduction of Michelangelo’s Pieta in the St. Paul Cathedral that was given by an anonymous donor.

In both cases, light streams through the kaleidoscopic glass of the great rose windows. You might be so caught up in the details and intricacies of the ceilings that you find statistics about the buildings irrelevant and pedantic, but one statistic might interest you — the basilica’s nave, the area in which the congregation gathers, is 82 feet wide, larger than St. Peter’s in Rome by two whole feet.

If you tell that to a disbelieving tourist, you might want to add that City Hall’s clock face is larger than Big Ben, too.

In the Roman era, a basilica was a public building with many purposes: politics, business, courts of law. The term in Catholic context means a church that’s been granted particular privileges by the pope. For decades the Minneapolis church was called a “procathedral” to indicate its relationship to the Cathedral of St. Paul; it was granted minor basilica status in 1926 by Pope Pius XI. The Minneapolis Sunday Tribune noted on Jan. 17, 1926, that the status was formally announced a day earlier, but apparently the locals knew about it even earlier. The announcement of the elevation “was made at services at the church Christmas Day.”

A cathedral is the HQ. The head office.

In the case of the Basilica of St. Mary, a parcel of land along Hennepin Avenue in Minneapolis worth more than $40,000 was donated by Lawrence Donaldson, owner of the department store Donaldsons.

The site of the cathedral had a more interesting pedigree: The commanding location was the site of a mansion built by Norman W. Kittson, an early settler of Minnesota who started off as fur trader, then became a railway entrepreneur before becoming the mayor of St. Paul. When he died in 1888, his will left a generous amount for the mansion’s upkeep, but by the early 1900s it had been reduced to a second-class boarding house.

The property was purchased for $52,000 in 1904. The house was demolished two years later, and the cornerstone laid for the cathedral in 1907, with a parade of 30,000 people filing past to cheer the event.

It’s a matter of opinion, of course. But it’s hard to dispute that the St. Paul Cathedral has the best view. When you walk out of the cathedral, you are elevated by the view: a perfect high point for seeing downtown stretch below you, with the dome of the State Capitol on the left echoing the dome of the cathedral. Church and state are seated on their respective thrones.

Basilica of St. Mary has been demeaned by the freeways that run along the west side of the building. When you walk out the door, you see elevated roads. The main landmark seen from the steps is the brutish block of the Walker Art Center, a showdown of church and contemporary art.

In either case, of course, it’s not the view from outside the matters, or even the beauty of the facade.

For those who attend, it’s not the architecture or the decorations that count the most, but the simple sound of the human voice in a space of great peace, speaking the words to the assembled. They could be much humbler buildings and achieve the same purpose. But we’re all the richer for their beauty.