ST. PATRICK’S CHURCH
ST. JACQUES CHURCH
The position of St. Patrick’s as a national church for the Irish was jeopardized in 1866, when the dismemberment of the ancient parish of Notre Dame was proclaimed. St. Patrick’s would have become in the new division a general district, one for use by French-Canadians, but on the representations of Father Dowd to the Holy See, the national privileges were confirmed to the church. Each succeeding pastor of St. Patrick’s has done much to the beautifying of this church, one of the purest specimens of the Gothic style in Canada. Its outside dimensions are: Length, 233 feet; width, 105 feet; inside height from floor to ceiling, 85 feet. The steeple is 228 feet high. The work of renovation of the interior of St. Patrick’s was carried out in 1893 under the late Father Quinlivan, S.S. pastor. Under the present pastor, the Rev. Gerald McShane, S.S., the parish has seen great improvements, notably those at the Eucharistic Congress of 1910 when the grounds adjoining the church and partially occupied hitherto by St. Bridget’s Orphanage were tastefully laid out as a semi-public garden. At this same time there took place the development of the chimes of St. Patrick’s. The following reproduction of the inscriptions on the memorial tables placed in the church tells its story:
AS A PERPETUAL MEMORIAL OF THE
XXI INTERNATIONAL EUCHARISTIC CONGRESS,
At MONTREAL, SEPT 7-11, A.D. 1910,
And in Lasting Remembrance of the Solemn Congress Mass
And the Presence of the CARDINAL LEGATE in