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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.