The Following is a Defend Life article from - Vol. 18 No. 2 - March - April 2007

The erudite and ascetic Fr. Casimir Peterson, in rose-colored chausible, is offering Tridentine High Mass at St. Alphonsus Church, the only church in Baltimore to offer the Tridentine Mass. Introibo ad altare Dei. Ad Deum qui laetificat juventutem meam. I will go unto the altar of God. To God, Who gives joy to my youth. To the Mass-goer over sixty, the old, familiar Latin words of the Mass are like long-lost friends. But young families with lots of well-behaved little children make up a good part of the hundred-plus attentive faithful in the pews. For the first ten minutes of the Mass, Msgr. Arthur Bastress, St. Alphonsus’ pastor, can be seen in one of the intricately carved confessionals, head tilted meditatively and resting on his hand, still hearing confessions. Then he pops up in the choir loft, vigorously leading the excellent choir in Gregorian chant. The twelve Apostles, posted in niches along both sides of the church, seem to be watching protectively the unfolding of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

Msgr. Arthur Bastress stands near the altar of the side chapel at

St. Alphonsus Church

     But the eye is drawn irresistibly toward the altar and to the brightly lit sanctuary, with its splendid profusion of ornate, ivory-hued scrollwork and soaring Gothic arches.

High above the altar, St. Alphonsus beams down, flanked by St. Boniface and St. Martin of Tours.

They in turn are flanked by rows of smaller saints – thirteen to the right, thirteen to the left.

The solemn yet triumphant music, the finely choreographed movements of priest and altar servers, the astonishing prodigality of color and light and beauty all affirm Fr. Frederick Faber’s declaration that "the Mass is the most beautiful thing this side of heaven." "We’re a good fit," Msgr. Bastress says of himself and St. Alphonsus Church.

     After half a century in the priesthood, "You like to have a challenge," the 80-year-old priest explains, and the

beautiful but badly deteriorating church fit the bill. He became pastor of St. Alphonsus in 1998 and has been its champion and protector ever since. When it opened its doors in 1845, just 24 years after the dedication of its neighbor, the Basilica of the Assumption, the Baltimore Sun proclaimed it "one of the most splendid churches, perhaps the most magnificent of any yet erected in this city." Designed by eminent architect Robert Cary Long in Southern neo-Gothic style, the church served Baltimore’s German community, while its attached rectory functioned as a provincial headquarters for the Redemptorist priests and brothers. St. Alphonsus has a saint-studded past. St. John Neumann was its pastor from 1848-49 and 1851-52, and Blessed Francis Seelos was pastor from 1854-57. "If Blessed Francis Seelos is canonized, this will be the only church in America that had two saints as former pastors," the Monsignor brags as he escorts a visitor through St. Alphonsus.

     "When the church was built, you didn’t have electricity or even gas lights," he remarks, pointing upward. "In the center of the church was a big brass chandelier ringed with three rows of candles, and there were big candelabra on each side of the altar." Later the church had gas lights inside glass globes, on poles screwed into the pews. "You can still see the screw marks," notes Bastress. Probably the most intriguing feature to the modern eye is the church’s original pulpit, which rests like an exquisitely wrought crow’s nest atop a huge pillar, and is reached by a stair that winds around the pillar.

     "Nowadays, we have microphones," explains Monsignor. "But then they had a high pulpit so the priest’s voice would carry." The elaborate canopy over the pulpit helps deflect the sound of the priest’s voice down to his listeners. While modern backs may find the church’s pews narrow and uncomfortable, "Back in those days, people had posture!" Monsignor exclaims. "Also, they were shorter." Ladies usually sat on the edge of seats anyway, he says. They had to; they wore hoops, and if they sat back, their hoop skirts would go flying up. The church’s beautiful side chapel is "fairly elaborate" because it was used by the Redemptorist novices, he says. It was built in one of two adjacent houses on Saratoga Street bought by the order. In 1892, fifteen bells were ordered from the McShane Bell Foundry, located in present-day Dundalk – "a symphony of fifteen bells for the faithful," according to a Latin inscription on one of the largest. That bell, weighing 3,800 pounds, and three smaller ones still remain, but McShane repossessed eleven others when the parish was unable to pay for them.

The four 115-year-old bells are still rung. By 1917, with the German community moved out to the suburbs, St. Alphonsus became a Lithuanian parish.

Saints adorn the sanctuary at St.

Alphonsus Church, on Saratoga

Street in downtown Baltimore.

     For generations afterwards, it served downtown shoppers, workers and visitors. But as businesses and stores moved out of the city, weekday attendance and donations diminished. Today, says the pastor, "They’re trying to rehab the city, and the city’s Catholic churches – the Basilica, St. Alphonsus, St. Jude’s, St. Vincent’s, and St. Ignatius, are each attracting different kinds of people and creating different communities." St. Alphonsus "attracts a lot of tourists who are taken by its history and its beauty – and its spirituality. It’s a very holy place," he says. Badly needed roof repair, completed in March, cost $600,000. "We’re trying to do it so it will last another 100 years. It’s always just been patched before. "Last year, if you stood by the windows with a cake of soap, you could have taken a shower, the way the rain was splashing down," the priest recalls. "It caused tremendous paint damage.

     "The next project will be pointing the bricks, to help keep water from coming in. Then we’ll repair the windows."

In the meantime, on Sundays St. Alphonsus has an 8:30 Lithuanian Mass, a 10:00 a.m. Mass in English, and a Tridentine Mass at 11:30 a.m. Weekday Masses are at 7:00 a.m. and noon. St. Alphonsus’ website is stalphonsusbalt.org.