Sometimes God works in mysterious ways, and so for the Easter vigil He gave us a majestic spectacle made of fire. As you can observe in the following photograph, there is a fire outlining the landscape. Above, the Moon reigns with its light…almost as if attentively watching after the church. On the right side you can see the apse of the structure penetrate the gardens.

Francesco, Jimmy and I had the great pleasure of documenting the Great Easter Vigil at St. Steven’s Serbian Orthodox Cathedral in Alhambra on Saturday night. It was a splendid liturgy in a beautiful space. As you can see, Francesco has already started posting photos. Watch as more photos are posted and we offer our usual background, which in the case of St. Steven’s promises to be most unusual!

Christ is risen! Indeed he is risen!

Since I didn’t post any images of the actual Christmas celebration inside the Holy Cross Cathedral in Montebello, I thought it would be interesting to show the moment when the blessing of the water occurs on the altar. It is a very moving moment, entirely wrapped in a fog of incense and chants.

On January 6, Eric and I have had the pleasure to witness the Armenian Christmas celebration at the Holy Cross Cathedral in Montebello.

The structure showcases some very interesting elements; in particular, the presence of theatre-like curtains separating the altar from the rest of the church. During the liturgy, the curtains opened and closed a few times, emphasizing the theatricality of their powerful celebration.

Underneath you can see a few images of details present in the building.

Detail of wooden cross sculpted at the base of the Bishop Chair with a stained glass in the background

Oldest cathedral church: The Cathedral of San Carlos Borromeo, Monterey, was founded as a mission church by Fr. Serra in 1770, and the present structure was completed in 1794. It became the pro-cathedral of the Diocese of Both Californias (then encompassing all of present-day California and Baja California) in 1840. It is the oldest cathedral church building in the United States, being completed three years before St. Augustine Cathedral in St. Augustine, Fla.

Newest cathedral: The Cathedral of Christ the Light, Oakland, will be dedicated in September 2008.

Largest cathedral: The Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, Los Angeles, is the 10th largest cathedral in the world and the largest Roman Catholic cathedral in the United States. It covers 65,000 square feet and is 333 feet in length (one foot longer than St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York).

Smallest cathedral: The Cathedral of San Carlos Borromeo, Monterey, is the smallest Roman Catholic cathedral in the continental United States.

First church built as a cathedral: The Cathedral of St. Mary of the Immaculate Conception, San Francisco, (Old St. Mary’s) was built in 1854.

First Orthodox cathedral: Holy Trinity Cathedral (Orthodox Church in America), San Francisco, was founded as California’s first permanent Orthodox parish in 1864 and became the cathedral in 1870.

First Orthodox church built as a cathedral: The present Holy Trinity Cathedral (Orthodox Church in America), San Francisco, was constructed in 1909.

Oldest Episcopal cathedral church: Trinity Cathedral, San Jose, was constructed as a parish church in 1863.

First Episcopal church built as a cathedral: The second Grace Church in San Francisco, built in 1862, was unofficially known as “Grace Cathedral.” The new Grace Cathedral was established in 1910 as a successor to this church.

City with the most cathedrals: Los Angeles is home to nine cathedrals.

The Armenian community of California has deep Christian roots. The Gospel was brought to Armenia by the apostles Thaddeus and Bartholomew in the First Century, and the Armenians were the first people to convert to Christianity as a nation in the year 301, when Christianity was still an illegal minority religion in the Roman Empire. They have retained a distinct form of Orthodox Christianity throughout their history as a people. They are not Eastern Orthodox, but Oriental Orthodox, a distinction they share with Christians of the Coptic, Ethiopian, Eritrean, Syrian and Malankara (Indian) traditions, all descended from the ancient patriarchate of Alexandria. Yet the Armenian Christian tradition is unique.

By the early 1800s, small numbers of Armenians began to immigrate to the United States, and their numbers increased in the late 1800s as they sought to escape persecution in the Ottoman Empire. By 1891, they had constructed the first Armenian church to be dedicated in the Western Hemisphere, The Church of Our Savior in Worcester, Mass.

Church of Our Savior, Worcester, Mass., circa 1891

And yet it is in the vast Central Valley that any California history of Armenians must begin. A large number of Armenian immigrants began to settle in the Fresno area by 1871. After several years of celebrating Divine Liturgy in local Protestant and Episcopal churches, the Fresno Armenian community constructed and dedicated the second Armenian church in the Western Hemisphere at F and Monterey Streets in 1900, Holy Trinity Church. That church was destroyed by fire in 1913, and ground was broken for a new church less than four months later at Ventura and M Streets in downtown Fresno. By 1914, the new church was built and dedicated. The new Holy Trinity Church was the first church in the United States built according to the principles of traditional Armenian architecture, although it was a Victorian adaptation of those concepts. It was designed by the first Armenian architect in America, Boghos Kondrajian (Lawrence Cone). Holy Trinity Church served as the cathedral for the new Western Diocese of the Armenian Church when it was established in 1927 (then called the California Prelacy).

Holy Trinity Church, Fresno

By 1907 an Armenian community had begun to develop in Los Angeles, and accordingly they sought the services of a priest from Fresno to celebrate the Badarak (Divine Liturgy) for them. Their Sunday worship was made possible by the hospitality of local Episcopal congregations, who allowed the Armenians the use of their churches (a close relationship between Armenians and Episcopalians in California made this a common arrangement). In 1921 the growing Armenian community bought a lot downtown at 420 E. 20th St., at Maple Street (in today’s Garment District) and completed the construction of Holy Cross Church in 1923, the first Armenian church built in Southern California.

Exterior of the first Holy Cross Church in downtown Los Angeles, circa 1923

Interior of first Holy Cross Church

In 1953, the congregation of Holy Cross Church chose to be aligned with the Catholicos of Cilicia in Lebanon rather than the Catholicos of Etchmiadzin in Armenia, as they had been to that point. The Cilicia jurisdiction of Armenians is represented in California by the Western Prelacy, based in La Crescenta with eight parishes; while the Etchmiadzin jurisdiction, the Western Diocese, is based in Burbank with 34 parishes. (That the Armenian Church has two branches, or catholicosates, is an historical anomaly and is merely jurisdictional, involving no disagreements in theology or practice.)

By the late 1950s, the dynamic and growing community of Holy Cross had outgrown their facilities downtown and in 1960 purchased land in Pico Rivera for a new school. The school opened in 1965, and it was decided by the congregation to build a new church in nearby Montebello on a five-acre plot on Lincoln Avenue, purchased in 1976. Plans for a new church building in the classical Armenian style were drawn up. The old church on 20th Street was sold to a Korean Methodist congregation and the final Badarak was celebrated there in July of 1978.

For the next three years, liturgy was celebrated in the school cafeteria as the congregation struggled — with great personal sacrifices — to raise funds for the new church building. They broke ground in 1980 and the first Badarak was celebrated in the new church in 1981. The church was finally consecrated in 1984 as the cathedral of the Western Prelacy.

Holy Cross Cathedral under construction

As the Southland’s first Armenian church, Holy Cross Cathedral claims as its spiritual children a number of other local Armenian churches. A true pioneering congregation, its status as a cathedral is a testament to the legacy it has given to the Armenian community of Southern California.

Many thanks to Fr. Ashod Kambourian, pastor of Holy Cross Cathedral, and Dr. Hagop Dikranian, board chairman, for their hospitality and for providing the archival photos and materials for the church history.

In a previous post on the history of St. Sophia Cathedral, I mentioned that congregation was first housed in a small church in what is today the Garment District in downtown Los Angeles. Yesterday through the kindness of the cathedral, I was able to scan some of their archival photos, so I can share a couple with you.

Annunciation Church was located at 1216 San Julian St. It was dedicated in 1912 and was in use until 1952, when St. Sophia Cathedral became the new home for this pioneering Greek Orthodox congregation.

First it’s very appropriate that we view the interior of the old church in the context of a wedding. Francesco’s last post of photos from St. Sophia depicted a wedding, so now we can connect that event to this wedding photo inside Annunciation Church sometime around 1947. What a beautiful reminder of the continuity of faith to see the same liturgy being celebrated decades apart and in such different settings.

Wedding in Annunciation Church circa 1947

Exterior of Annunciation Church

Thanks once again to the ever-helpful Jimmy Karatsikis, the cathedral staff and Fr. Bill Tragus for their hospitality.