The Resurrection of Chicago’s “Mexican Cathedral”

Mexicans and other Latinos today comprise 44% of Chicago Catholics. A great number of them know St. Francis of Assisi Church as the city’s “Mexican cathedral.” This status flew in the face of the archdiocese of Chicago’s desire to impose a vision of a unified, American Catholic identity upon a city of diverse ethnic parishes. St. Francis originally served Germans. With a growing Mexican population, it became a “Spanish speaking” parish in the 1920s. It attracted newly-arrived immigrants to continue their Catholic devotion in Chicago, praying in Spanish underneath German stained glass windows. The old church attained a cathedral-like status for subsequent generations as the favored site of family weddings, baptisms, and funerals. In a wave of parish closings, the archdiocese closed the “Mexican cathedral” in 1994. Crews padlocked the doors and removed the pews and stained glass windows. Parishioners protested the closure by various means, including occupying the church with the wrecking ball outside. The archdiocese reversed its decision and the church reopened, but with its interior stripped. Parishioners mourned the loss of the German windows. The parishioners’ militancy gave way to committees that planned new images for the sanctuary, relevant to the Mexican majority parish. This paper examines these events, with special attention to the design of a new stained glass windows that radically re-envisioned what it means to be a Latino Catholic in Chicago. The resurrection of St. Francis church, embodied in its new windows, exemplifies how Latinos countered Americanization plans and have changed the archdiocese. This story highlights the ways that Latino Catholics balance loyalties to a universal Catholic Church and archdiocese while simultaneously upholding the culture of home in Latin America.