Cathedral · Other

St Patrick's Cathedral

New York, USA

"St Patrick's Cathedral on Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan is the most visited church in the United States..."

Highlights

1The most visited church in the United States — over 5 million visitors per year
2Built between 1858 and 1878 as a monument to Irish Catholic presence in America The St Patrick's Day Parade on Fifth Avenue ends at the cathedral every March 17 Has hosted state funerals for Robert Kennedy, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, and others The white marble neo-Gothic facade is one of the most iconic buildings on Fifth Avenue

Getting There

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Address

5th Ave, New York, NY 10022, USA

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Directions

Fifth Avenue at 50th and 51st Streets. Subway: B/D/F/M to 47-50th Sts-Rockefeller Ctr, or E/M to 5th Ave-53rd St. Multiple bus lines serve Fifth Avenue. 2 minutes walk from Rockefeller Center.

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Timings

Current time — Eastern Time (ET)

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When	Hours	Note
Cathedral	6:30 AM - 8:45 PM

daily Entry is free and open at all times. Visitor tours available. The St Patrick's Day Mass (March 17) requires advance reservation. Major Masses (Christmas, Easter) fill to capacity — arrive early.

Masses & Events

Daily Mass

7, 7:30, 8, 8:30 AM; 12:05, 12:30, 1, 5:30 PM (Mon-Fri)

Active schedule — multiple

Masses daily Sunday Masses

7, 8, 9, 10:15 AM; 12:00, 1, 4, 5:30 PM

The 10:15 AM is the principal sung

Mass St Patrick's Day Mass

March 17

The most attended annual Mass; nationally significant

Must See

The White Marble Exterior

Fifth Avenue facing Rockefeller Center [OUTDOOR] The white Tuckahoe marble facade

twin spires at 100 metres, flying buttresses on the sides, Gothic pointed arches — makes an extraordinary statement against the glass towers of Midtown Manhattan. The contrast between the 19th-century Gothic church and the 20th-century commercial architecture surrounding it is the defining visual tension of American Catholicism.

The High Altar and Baldachin

Sanctuary, east end The bronze baldachin (canopy) above the high altar is modelled on the one in St Peter's Basilica in Rome. The white marble altar and the surrounding sanctuary represent the aspirations of Irish Catholic New York to legitimacy and grandeur.

The Lady Chapel

Behind the high altar The intimate Lady Chapel, with its fine stained glass and its original 1906 Carrara marble altar, is the most devotionally rich space in the cathedral

quieter than the main nave and preferred by regular worshippers over tourists. The Pietà — Left aisle The cathedral's Pietà — a replica of Michelangelo's, three times the size — draws a constant flow of pilgrims, particularly those who have lost someone they love. The figure of Mary holding the dead Christ is the most emotionally available image in the cathedral.

The Stained Glass Windows

Throughout the nave The cathedral's stained glass windows span from the 19th century to contemporary commissions. The Rose Window above the main entrance and the windows of the nave aisles depict saints and biblical scenes.

The light they cast

deep reds and blues in a white marble interior

is the dominant sensory experience of St Patrick's on a sunny morning.

Intentions

Carry these intentions into the Basilica with you — pause at each sacred spot and lift them to God.

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For the Irish community of America and all immigrant communities who built their faith in a new land

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For New York and the millions who live in its shadow

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For those who work in the buildings surrounding this cathedral

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For the poor and homeless who pass this door every day

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For those who have been married, baptised, or buried in this church

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For St Patrick, who brought the Gospel to Ireland in the 5th century

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For a Church that is present at the centre of the world's most powerful city

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For those who come in here to pray, in the middle of the most commercial street on earth

Reflection

Archbishop Hughes built this cathedral on Fifth Avenue deliberately, in the heart of anti-Catholic Protestant New York, as a statement: we are here, we are permanent, we are not going away. He was right. The Irish stayed. The Italians came. The Latinos came. The Cathedral stands. The buildings around it have been demolished and rebuilt three times since 1878. The cathedral has not moved an inch. Some things last longer than the commercial structures built around them. This is one of those things.

Suggested Scripture — Matthew 16:18

And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.

Read in full on Bible Gateway →

A Pilgrim's Prayer

St Patrick, missionary bishop who converted a nation with nothing but faith and a bishop's staff, pray for those of us in this city who are drowning in noise and speed and the insistence that everything is for sale. Let this building be our proof that not everything is for sale. Let the white marble of these towers outlast the glass around it. And let us leave this cathedral remembering what endures. Amen.

St Patrick’s Cathedral on Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan is the most visited church in the United States, receiving over five million visitors per year. The neo-Gothic structure — white marble, twin spires, flying buttresses — stands between Rockefeller Center and the luxury retail shops of Fifth Avenue, an act of deliberate religious assertion against the commercial capital of the world.

Irish America

Its story is inseparable from the story of Irish Catholic immigration to America. Construction began in 1858 and was completed in 1878, in the era of massive Irish immigration following the Great Famine. Archbishop John Hughes, himself an Irish immigrant, drove the project as a statement that the Catholic Church — and the Irish community it served — had a permanent and monumental place in American life. The cathedral was completed just as the Statue of Liberty was arriving in the harbour — two monuments to different versions of the American promise, visible from each other across the bay.

Civic Life

St Patrick’s Day on March 17 transforms Fifth Avenue into the route of the world’s most famous parade, ending at the cathedral. The annual St Patrick’s Day Mass, the state funerals held here (Robert Kennedy, Babe Ruth and Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis among others), and the cathedral’s continuous role in New York’s civic religious life make it the most historically charged Catholic building in America.