funds and fixes for A Neighborhood 'treasure'

BY SARAH NELSON

A landmark building faces a milestone birthday: Church of the Blessed Sacrament on the Upper West Side is one year away from turning a century old. The exterior of the Catholic church, built on 71st Street east of Broadway in 1917, has shown some wear and tear. Recently, a piece of the cast stone façade crumbled to the sidewalk, though no one was injured. The parish is now campaigning to raise the money needed to repair the slate roof and façade.

According to the Rev. John P. Duffell, who has served as pastor for two-and-a-half years, the community has so far raised $2.3 million of their total overall goal of about $6 million. Façade and roof repairs and asbestos removal alone require $2.3 million. Other repairs, categorized as urgent, include façade repointing and recasting ($835,000), and the installation of a new slate roof ($525,000), replacing the current 100-year-old roof.

The rest of the work includes stained-glass tracery repair ($150,000), elevation repointing ($450,000), and other overhead costs.

The New York Landmarks Conservancy awarded a Challenge Grant of $40,000 for Church of the Blessed Sacrament in May as part of the organization's Sacred Sites grants.

“We are honored to help these amazing institutions and determined to maintain our ability to do so,” Peg Breen, President of the New York Landmarks Conservancy said in a press release.

The Neo-Gothic church hosts a weekly soup kitchen, a Community Supported Agriculture program, senior outreach, women's groups and more. The church also runs the School of the Blessed Sacrament, a parish-based pre-K through eighth grade Catholic school, home to 380 students.

The first parish of the Church of the Blessed Sacrament was founded in 1887. Father Matthew A. Taylor, the church's original pastor, held the first Mass on Easter of that year at an altar within a stable on West 72nd Street. The church's red brick building was constructed in July 1887 on 71st St. The parochial school opened in 1903.

As the Upper West Side became increasingly more residential, the congregation of 800 people needed a larger church. Upon Father Taylor's death in 1916 (he had become a monsignor in 1914), ground-breaking for the new building began.

Columbia graduate and architect Gustave Steinback completed the church's new design in 1921, modeling the building after the French Gothic church of Saint Chapelle in Paris. Designer Clement Heaton of West Nyack, New York created the church's rose window, a stained glass depiction of twelve angels playing musical instruments. Heaton also designed six of the clerestory windows and seven of the lower windows. Thirty-two years after the original church opened, the parish celebrated its first Mass in the current building.

Now Church of the Blessed Sacrament has an average of 1500 attendees for Sunday Worship, according to Daniel Champoli, the church business manager.

“Blessed Sacrament is a great and lively parish—very diverse and welcoming,” Champoli said.

With the 100 year anniversary approaching, the Rev. Duffell also praised his parish for their high levels of involvement in the fundraising campaign, referring to them as people of God.

Said the pastor: “The church building is a treasure.”