And so, 700 years later, on this day in 1923, this great church, the fourth Blackfriars of London, was consecrated by Cardinal Bourne to continue the Dominican mission of preaching for the salvation of souls in the capital city of this United Kingdom.Īs the Epistle today declares: “Behold, the dwelling of God is with men. However, the Dominicans who first arrived in England 800 years ago in 1221 had built their first London Priory in Holborn in August 1223. Present at this historic event was the Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster, Nicholas Wiseman, who had invited the Dominican friars back to London after the desolation wrought by the English Reformation after 1538. Already in 1863, twenty years before the church was opened, the foundation stone (which is still visible from the Rosary Garden) had been laid by the Master of the Dominican Order, Jandel. This church, reputedly the fifth largest in London, had cost £40,000 to build and it took those four decades for the Dominicans, relying on the help of countless benefactors, to completely pay for the building churches cannot be consecrated if they remain in debt, hence the interval between the opening and the consecration of this church. It was only on the 1st of August in 1923 that this Dominican priory church was consecrated, some forty years after it had been opened in 1883.
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