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St. Michael’s Roman Catholic Church, Philadelphia There are also Sunday (10 a.m.) and holy day Masses (usually at noon) in English at Immaculate Conception Church worship site. The website for the parish is here.

2 Founding The parish was founded in 1831, the first Catholic Church in the County of Philadelphia (but not within the Philadelphia City limits) on land purchased for $3,333.00.[3] The cemetery connected to the church was the first Catholic cemetery in the Philadelphia area. The original pastor, who served from 1833 until 1843, was the Very Rev. Terence Donaghoe, who also founded the Sisters of Charity, BVM with Mother Mary Frances Clarke and invited them to teach in the parish school.

3 Destruction church

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The Baptismal font in front of the St. Joseph’s altar at St. Michael’s Church in Philadelphia.

St. Michael’s Roman Catholic Church is an active parish of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Philadelphia located at Second and Jefferson Streets in Philadelphia, in the West Kensington section of the city (sometimes referred to as "Old Kensington").

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Today

The parish assumed its current configuration under Parish Administrator Msgr. John J. Miller, when St. Michael’s absorbed the neighboring parish of Immaculate Conception in July 2011.[1] Msgr. Miller served as parochial administrator at St. Michael’s from early 2011 until he was replaced in 2014] by the Rev. Arturo Chagala, who had been ordained in the Denver Archdiocese in 2013.[2] As of March 2015, the church has daily Mass at 8 a.m. Monday through Friday in the rectory chapel with Masses on Saturday evening at 5 p.m. and in the church on Sunday at 8:30 a.m. (English) and 11:00 a.m. (Spanish). On most holy days of obligation there is a 7 p.m. bi-lingual Mass. View of the Churchyard at St. Michael’s Church in Philadelphia 1

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REFERENCES

The initial church was destroyed in the Nativist Riots of 1844. The unrest began when the Catholic Bishop Francis Kenrick petitioned the Public School Board to allow use of the Douay-Rheims (Catholic) translation of the Bible by Catholic students, instead of forcing them to use the Authorized (King James/Protestant) Version as did other students. A Nativist meeting to plan opposition to this initiative was stopped by the Irish Catholics and, following a second meeting in a local market which the Catholics considered their territory, violence broke out, during which an Irish Catholic was seriously injured and a Nativist killed after shots were fired from inside a local Irish Catholic volunteer fire house, the Hibernia Hose Company, as well as by Nativists on the street. The riots were only stopped after two Catholic churches, St. The rear of St. Michael’s Church in Philadelphia showing the Michael’s and St. Augustine’s, burned, when, the follow- organ with American and Papal flags flying from the front of ing day, cannon were set up in front of the city’s Catholic the choir loft.

Cathedral (St. John the Evangelist) and General George Cadwalader, who was in command of the state militia, 5 Links with educational instituthreatened to shoot on anyone continuing the disorder.

tions It took several years for the church to be rebuilt, along the pattern of the original church, using an award of $27,000.00 granted in December, 1847 in a suit against La Salle University began at the St. Michael’s School at Philadelphia County for failing to protect the church and Second and Jefferson Streets in Philadelphia when the surrounding buildings.

Christian Brothers opened a school there and taught their Several long term changes resulted from the 1844 riots. first classes on July 20, 1858. Initially known as the “ First, the “outlying” districts of Philadelphia County, like Select School,” it eventually took the name “Christian Kensington, Northern Liberties and Southwark (where Brothers Academy.” In 1863, the Academy became the St. Philip Neri Church was also almost destroyed by fire) college preparatory division of what was then La Salle were incorporated into the City of Philadelphia and the College. In 1867, La Salle moved to Juniper and Filpolice and fire departments in those areas unified with the bert Streets; ultimately, the campus relocated to the Olcity’s. Secondly, Bishop Kenrick, dropped the tactic of ney Section of Philadelphia in 1929. The High School trying to influence the treatment of Catholic students in separated from the College and moved to Wyndmoor in the public schools in favor of creating exclusive parochial the 1960s. However, the connection with LaSalle lives on in a new school opened several years ago in one of the schools for Catholic children. parish buildings.

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Changes of population and area

The membership of the church, at that time largely an Irish parish adjacent to the handloom weaving mills in Kensington where both Catholic and Protestant Irish immigrants worked, grew exponentially after the Irish Potato Famine in the late 1840s, but, as the surrounding area saw the founding of additional Catholic churches, its territory and population dropped as the Catholics in the area were divided among other parishes.

Today, the parish boundaries extend broadly from West Kensington into Kensington, Fishtown and Northern Liberties, increasing notably after it assumed the territory of the neighboring Immaculate Conception Parish in 2011 when that parish was suppressed and made a worship site of St. Michael’s.[4] In addition, there is a significant Latino population, mostly concentrated in West Kensington, along with other ethnic groups in the remaining parts of the parish.

Several years after St. Michael’s Parish School closed, in 2002, the vacant convent was converted for use as LaSalle Academy of Philadelphia, a grade school meant to serve children from the immediate area of the parish which includes among its trustees members of the Christian Brothers and the Sisters of St. Joseph. It features class sizes of 15 or less, with an 11 month academic calendar.

6 References [1] http://archphila.org/press%20releases/pr001820.php [2] http://catholicphilly.com/2014/06/news/local-news/ clergy-assignment-changes-announced-7/ [3] http://home.catholicweb.com/StMichaelsHistory/index. cfm/NewsItem?ID=233596&From=Home [4] http://archphila.org/parishes/8270.php

3 Coordinates: 39°58′24″N 75°08′19″W / 39.97335°N 75.13862°W

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7 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES

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Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses

7.1

Text

• St. Michael’s Roman Catholic Church, Philadelphia Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St.%20Michael’{}s%20Roman% 20Catholic%20Church%2C%20Philadelphia?oldid=660145258 Contributors: Bearcat, TiMike, Bgwhite, Wmflanagan, The Anomebot2, Yobot and RevelationDirect

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• File:Baptismal_Font_at_St._Michael’{}s_Philadelphia.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/48/ Baptismal_Font_at_St._Michael%27s_Philadelphia.jpg License: CC BY-SA 4.0 Contributors: Own work Original artist: Wmflanagan • File:Organ_and_Choir_Loft.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ef/Organ_and_Choir_Loft.jpg License: CC BY-SA 4.0 Contributors: Own work Original artist: Wmflanagan • File:Panoramic_View_of_Cemetery.jpg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/51/Panoramic_View_of_ Cemetery.jpg License: CC BY-SA 4.0 Contributors: Own work Original artist: Wmflanagan

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