Cristo Rey Church () is a

Roman Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...

parish church A parish church (or parochial church) in Christianity is the Church (building), church which acts as the religious centre of a parish. In many parts of the world, especially in rural areas, the parish church may play a significant role in com ...

Canyon Road Canyon Road (formerly known as Great Plank Road) is a major road and partial state highway, which serves as a connector between Beaverton and Portland, Oregon, United States. It was the first major road constructed between the Tualatin V ...

in Santa Fe,

New Mexico New Mexico is a state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States. It is one of the Mountain States of the southern Rocky Mountains, sharing the Four Corners region with Utah, Colorado, and Arizona. It also ...

. It is one of the most notable buildings designed by influential Santa Fe architect

John Gaw Meem John Gaw Meem IV (November 17, 1894 – August 4, 1983) was an American architect based in Santa Fe, New Mexico. He is best known for his instrumental role in the development and popularization of the Pueblo Revival Style and as a proponent of a ...

and is claimed by some sources to be the largest

adobe Adobe (from arabic: الطوب Attub ; ) is a building material made from earth and organic materials. is Spanish for mudbrick. In some English-speaking regions of Spanish heritage, such as the Southwestern United States, the term is use ...

building in the United States. It is also notable for its historic

altar screen A Dossal (or dossel, dorsel, dosel), from French ''dos'' (''back''), is one of a number of terms for something rising from the back of a church altar. In modern usage, it primarily refers to cloth hangings but it can also denote a board, often ...

, the Reredos of Our Lady of Light, which is listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

. The reredos was carved in 1761 and originally hung in ''La Castrense'', a military chapel on the

Santa Fe Plaza The Santa Fe Plaza (Spanish language, Spanish: ''Plaza de Santa Fe'') is a National Historic Landmark in downtown Santa Fe, New Mexico in the style of traditional Spanish-American colonial cities. The plaza, or city square is a gathering place ...

. It has been described as "one of the most extraordinary pieces of ecclesiastical art in the country". with The church was dedicated in 1940.

History

The church was commissioned by

Archbishop of Santa Fe The Archdiocese of Santa Fe (, ) is a Latin Church ecclesiastical territory, or archdiocese, of the southwestern region of the United States in the state of New Mexico. While the mother church of the archdiocese, the Cathedral Basilica of St. Fr ...

Rudolph Gerken in 1939 and completed in 1940. The project served three purposes: to provide a new parish church on Santa Fe's east side, to commemorate the 400th anniversary of

Francisco Vázquez de Coronado Francisco Vázquez de Coronado (; 1510 – 22 September 1554) was a Spanish conquistador and explorer who led a large expedition from what is now Mexico to present-day Kansas through parts of the southwestern United States between 1540 and 1542 ...

's expedition to New Mexico, and to provide a permanent home for the Reredos of Our Lady of Light. The stone reredos was carved in 1761 and was originally installed in the Chapel of Our Lady of Light, also known as ''La Castrense'', on the

. More recently, it had been stored for decades under less than ideal circumstances in a rarely visited room of St. Francis Cathedral. The new church allowed it to be returned to full public display for the first time since 1859. The church was one of the most ambitious adobe buildings ever undertaken in New Mexico, requiring 150,000–200,000 individual adobes. Around 120 laborers worked onsite to manufacture and lay the adobes and cut logs and branches into vigas and latillas. A total of 222 large logs were required for the ceiling. The church was dedicated on June 27, 1940.

Architecture

Cristo Rey Church was designed by

in the

Pueblo Revival The Pueblo Revival style or Santa Fe style is a regional architectural style of the Southwestern United States, which draws its inspiration from Santa Fe de Nuevo México's traditional Pueblo architecture, the Spanish missions, and Territor ...

style, drawing inspiration from New Mexico's historic Spanish missions. In particular, the design borrows elements from San Estevan Del Rey Mission Church at

Acoma Pueblo Acoma Pueblo ( , ) is a Native American pueblo approximately west of Albuquerque, New Mexico, in the United States. Four communities make up the village of Acoma Pueblo: Sky City (Old Acoma), Acomita, Anzac, and McCartys. These communities ...

and San José de Gracia Church in Las Trampas. Like its antecedents, the church is built from

, though it is supported by a hidden steel frame rather than relying completely on traditional building techniques. The building is massive in scale, long, wide, and high, and the adobe walls are up to thick in places. Architecture critic Chris Wilson described the building as "the last, great adobe mission". The facade is asymmetrical, with two battered towers of different heights separated by a recessed balcony above the main entrance. Inside, the church follows a traditional Latin cross plan with an aisleless

nave The nave () is the central part of a church, stretching from the (normally western) main entrance or rear wall, to the transepts, or in a church without transepts, to the chancel. When a church contains side aisles, as in a basilica-type ...

transept A transept (with two semitransepts) is a transverse part of any building, which lies across the main body of the building. In cruciform ("cross-shaped") cruciform plan, churches, in particular within the Romanesque architecture, Romanesque a ...

, and polygonal

apse In architecture, an apse (: apses; from Latin , 'arch, vault'; from Ancient Greek , , 'arch'; sometimes written apsis; : apsides) is a semicircular recess covered with a hemispherical Vault (architecture), vault or semi-dome, also known as an ' ...

. The ceiling is supported on massive,

corbel In architecture, a corbel is a structural piece of stone, wood or metal keyed into and projecting from a wall to carry a wikt:superincumbent, bearing weight, a type of bracket (architecture), bracket. A corbel is a solid piece of material in t ...

ed vigas in the traditional manner, and there is a

clerestory A clerestory ( ; , also clearstory, clearstorey, or overstorey; from Old French ''cler estor'') is a high section of wall that contains windows above eye-level. Its purpose is to admit light, fresh air, or both. Historically, a ''clerestory' ...

above the altar to illuminate the Reredos of Our Lady of Light which is installed at the west end. The pews, confessionals, and doors are all wooden and were made by students at the Lourdes trade school in

Albuquerque Albuquerque ( ; ), also known as ABQ, Burque, the Duke City, and in the past 'the Q', is the List of municipalities in New Mexico, most populous city in the U.S. state of New Mexico, and the county seat of Bernalillo County, New Mexico, Bernal ...

References

{{reflist Roman Catholic churches in Santa Fe, New Mexico Roman Catholic churches completed in 1940 Pueblo Revival architecture in Santa Fe, New Mexico Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Santa Fe 20th-century Roman Catholic church buildings in the United States

History

Architecture

See also

References