Two years ago, in March 2023, I visited Holy Name of Jesus Cathedral in Raleigh with camera in hand. The seat of the Raleigh Diocese had opened in July 2017, replacing Sacred Heart Cathedral downtown. The new cathedral is at 715 Nazareth St., on the southern fringe of the city, not far from the State Farmers Market site.
I made an extensive volume of exterior shots of the new cathedral in that 2023 visit, but I was not able to get inside. The doors were locked (I was not surprised). At the time, the church’s parish center was still under construction, and I included some construction pictures I took in the post I did about the shoot.
So while out shooting a few churches this past Saturday, I was in the vicinity of the cathedral again and decided to stop and get some images of the finished parish center. But the trip turned out to be serendipitous — and much more productive. As I parked my car upon arrival, I saw a few people walking to their parked cars from the main doors. One person was a woman holding an infant, and I surmised that perhaps a baptismal ceremony had just wrapped up inside the cathedral … and wondered if an entry door might be unlocked.
I was correct on both counts.
I slipped inside and started firing away. I didn’t deliberate; I took as many pictures as quickly as I could because I figured someone was going to lock up at some point, and probably soon, and chase me away. I had taken more pictures than I thought I would when, as expected, a woman approached me and said that, indeed, the church was going lock up and I would have to leave.
When I exited, I took care of the business I came for — photographing the new (OK, new to me anyway) parish center, after which I took a slow walk around the main cathedral to make some “different perspective” shots and closeups of the dome and top of the bell carillon.
The July 2017 article you can access by following this link provides background and a detailed description of the cathedral’s construction, including some splendid — and accurate — illustrations.
The photo leading off the post is a shot of the sanctuary, including the altar, tabernacle and traditional crucifix above the tabernacle. For all of the interior images, for which I needed to use a high ISO (which, of course, introduced inordinate noise/grain into those images), I pulled my RAW images up in Photoshop Elements during post-processing and used the noise reduction sliders to the hilt. I thought they did a good job of minimizing noise.
The next two posts will be devoted to other churches I photographed on Aug. 30.
The baptismal font near the entrance (above) and a shot of the rear of the church (below), including the choir loft and the massive organ pipes. A closer look at the pipes appears in the second photo below. A look at the decorative dome (above), a closer look at the altar and tabernacle (below) and a closeup of the tabernacle (second photo below).
The image above is the very last one I was able to take inside the church proper, although I’ll present a few more I took earlier to this below. The image above is a look at the pews and statue of St. Mary, the mother of Jesus, a section of the sanctuary that is off to the left of the main altar. I was going to do a "balancer" shot and photograph the right side seating area and statue immediately after taking the one above, but right after I took the above photo, the woman approached me and asked me to leave. The church interior is populated by many statues, as shown in the images below. You can click on the statue photos to enlarge. In most cases, except the first two, you can read the featured person’s identification material below the statue.
A shot of one of the stain-glass windows (above) is higher up the wall than the more colorful mosaic window several photos above. Below, is the illustration for fifth station of the Stations of the Cross. It was the only station I was able to photograph before having to leave. The fifth station finds Simon of Cyrene helping Jesus carry the cross en route to Mount Calvary. For the benefit of non-Catholics, the 14 Stations of the Cross are a series of illustrations like the one above that are spread out evenly, in numerical order, along the two side walls. They enable the church faithful to make a spiritual pilgrimage, station by station, to Jerusalem to contemplate and better appreciate Jesus’ suffering and death in the redemption of humankind’s sins. The Stations are particularly poignant during Lent, when Catholics prepare to — and eventually observe — Holy Week and all that transpired in the life of Jesus during that period.
Above is the cathedral vestibule inside the main doors. You can see the doors to the seating area, with the baptismal font front and center, in the distance. On opposite sides of the vestibule are the displays you see in the two photos below. I don't know it for a fact, but I believe these are areas used for the Sacrament of Confession.
The finished parish center exterior (above). Below is a shot of the building under construction during my visit in March 2023. Below the construction shot are two more pictures of the finished facility from Saturday's shoot.
The bulk of the parish center can be seen (above) just over the brick walls along a stairway to a door on the backside of the cathedral. Below are perspective and closeup shots of rounded (turrets) portions of architecture along with the dome and top of the bell carillon.
Above: In my March 2023 visit, the floral arrangement seen here was not in bloom on this centerpiece in the roundabout in front of the cathedral.
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