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THE BULLETIN OF THE CATHOLIC LAYMEN’S ASSOCIATION OF GEORGIA
19
belong to God, if there had been anything inconsis
tent in the nature of these two duties. The way of
their conscientious fulfilment can never be in doubt
in the minds of intelligent and rightly disposed
people.
“Are Catholics taught that they owe allegiance to
the Pope first before the State?”
No, Catholics are bound in conscience to give com
plete and undivided allegiance to the State in all that
pertains to the State. At the same time they owe
allegiance to the Pope in all that pertains to his office
as head on earth of the Church of Christ. There is
no first and second, no before or after, in the mat
ter; the two are merely different, with both equally
sacred and binding and alike indispensable to right
ordered and conscientious life in society.
THE CHURCH OF THE IMMACULATE
CONCEPTION, ATLANTA, GEORGIA
(Continued from Page 1)
ville, about the year 1843. At that time Georgia was
a part of the diocese of Charleston which embraced
the Carolinas, Georgia and Florida, and the priests
who occasionally visited this small flock had to come
very often from a great distance, Savannah, and
other places.
It is said that when the priest came to visit them,
Holy Mass was said at the home of Mr. Terence
Doonan, who lived on or in the vicinity of what is
now Whitehall street. The facilities, however, of
fered by Mr. Doonan soon became inadequate to ac
commodate the growing congregation, augmented as
it was by mechanics and laborers working on the
railroad, then in course of construction. Through
the generosity of a Protestant gentleman, Mr. Sam
uel Mitchell, a site was donated to Mr. Terence
Doonan for a Catholic Church, which embraced an
acre, more or less, the same site where the present
structure now stands.
Upon the first visitation of Bishop Reynolds, the
second Bishop of Charleston, to confer the Sacrament
of Confirmation, a deed to the aforesaid lot was
drawn up and turned over to the Bishop in fee sim
ple forever, for Ecclesiastical purposes, with the pro
viso that upon the formation" of Georgia itself into
a diocese all claim to the aforesaid lot should be
vested in the Bishop of the new diocese. The few
Catholics then got together and had a Church built,
a modest frame structure, with a seating capacity
of four hundred. The picture of it may be seen yet
in the homes of the old inhabitants. It is said that
Miss B. Cannon, who died this year, was the first
child to be baptized in the old Church.
The first resident pastor of Atlanta was the Rev.
J. F. O’Neill, Jr. He resided there and attended to
the spiritual needs of the scattered Catholics living
at Rome, Dalton, Newnan and several other stations
on the Georgia Railroad and Central Railroad of
Georgia. This small Church for several years
served for all the needs of the small flock, but when
Atlanta arose from the ashes, in which she found
herself laid in the wake of the Civil War, and began
to grow from a town into a city of some pretentions,
it soon became evident that the Catholic congrega
tion also was outgrowing the capacity of the first
Church and at a meeting called by the Pastor, the
Rev. Thomas O’Reilly, it was decided to erect a
larger and more imposing edifice.
Mr. Parkins, musician and architect, drew up the
plans of the new church and they were accepted.
The style of architecture was an imitation of tha
Romanesaue. It is 150 feet in length, 75 feet in
width and 60 or more feet in height, flanked by two
towers, the highest of which is about 140 feet. The
cornerstone was laid September 1, 1869. There is
no record left giving the exact time of its dedica
tion. By some it is said that the dedication took
place in the year 1873, probably on the festival of
the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin
Mary, the patroness of the Church.
The length of time during which it was building
shows that it was a greater undertaking than the
Pastor or people at first thought. Father O’Reilly
never lived to see the church completed; his remains,
with those of Father Cleary, a succeeding Pastor,
rest in the crypt under the sanctuary. Marble tab
lets, erected in their memory, have been placed in
the vestibule. The stone used in the construction of
the basement was excavated from the farm of one
of the parishoners, Mr. Patrick Lynch. The stone
masons who constructed the basement, nearly all of
them Catholics who donated their time and labor,
were surely experts in their line for there is no
workmanship to be found these days as that which
they put into the basement of their Church.
All the windows except the small ones in the
clear-story are memorial windows. The window of Im
maculate Conception over the High Altar was do
nated by the Immaculate Conception Sodality; the one
in the chapel of the Blessed Virgin was given by Da
vid Wallace, while the other in the chapel of St.
Joseph was the gift of Patrick Fitzgibbons. The
transept window on the north side was donated by
Mr. John Ryan; the one on the south side was given
by M. A. Dougherty and family. The rose windows
above the transepts were donations from John and
Arthur Connolly.
The other windows in the main body of the Church
were donations from Michael Mahoney, Michael
Lynch, John Stephens, Owen Lynch, P. H. O’Neill,
Sodality of the Holy Angels, 0. C. Carroll, Patrick
Daly, Michael Bloomfield and R. Burns. The large
window in the facade of the Church was given by St.
Joseph’s Sodality. By a careful attention given to
renewing these windows, which are plain stained
glass bearing some pious . emblems of the Blessed
Sacrament, of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, of Mary
and of the passions of Our Lord, are practically in
tact. The donors have all passed from earth and
even very few are the descendants who have not
moved into other parishes.
Father James M. O’Brien, who was Pastor in
1880, replaced the wooden altars by three beautiful
marble altars. Father Keiley, (now Bishop), who
was Pastor from 1886 to 1896, placed and blessed
the mammoth bell, weighing 4,000 pounds, the lar
gest, perhaps, in Atlanta; and he likewise during his
pastorate installed the large magnificent $6,000.00
organ built by the well known builders, Pilcher Bros.,
Louisville, Ky. This organ is still in prime condition
after thirty-five years of constant service. About
the year of 1897 while the Pastor, Father Bazin,
was on a vacation in Europe, Bishop Becker under
took to remodel the interior of the sanctuary. By
the changes then introduced, the sanctuary was very
much enlarged and along certain lines its beauty was
very much enhanced. In 1907 the hot air furnaces,
which only attempted to heat the church, were taken
out and a large steam-heating plant installed. It has
been found very satisfactory. At that time also, the
Church was freed from all encumbrances and since
then stands without one penny of debt on it.
During the summer the finance committee is con
templating an outlay of $6,000.00 or $7,000.00 in
overhauling the slate roof, the exterior and interior;
most of the necessary fund is already in the treas
ury.
The following priests have served as pastors of
the church: Rev. F. O’Neill, Jr., 1850 to 1859; Rev.
Jas. Hasson, 1859 to 1861; Rev. Thomas O’Reilly,
1861-1872; Rev. John Duggan, 1872-1874; Rev. M.
T. Reilly, 1874-1877; Rev. T. J. Rebmar, 1877-1879;
Rev. James O’Brien, 1879-1881; Rev. Thos. T. Cleary,
1881-1884; Rev. John Kirsch, 1884M886 and Rev.
Father Keiley, now Bishop, 1886-1896; Rev. Father
Bazin, V. G.; 1896-1907; Rev. Robt. T. Kennedy,
1907 to the present time.