The Basilica and Expiatory Church of the Holy Family

By Catholic Online (NEWS CONSORTIUM)
5/13/2014 (3 years ago)
Catholic Online (https://www.catholic.org)

The Basilica and Expiatory Church of the Holy Family is large, Roman Catholic Church in Barcelona, Spain. Although the church is incomplete, it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and in November of 2010 Pope Benedict XVI consecrated the church and proclaimed it a minor basilica.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - While construction of Sagrada Familia, the church's Spanish name, began in 1882, Catalan architect Antoni Gaudi took over in 1883, transforming the project with his architectural and engineering style - combining Gothic and curvilinear, Art Nouveau forms with ambitious structural columns and arches.

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Gaudi devoted his last years to the project and at the time of his death in 1926, less than a quarter of the project was complete. Sagrada Familia's construction progressed slowly as it relied on private donations and was interrupted by the Spanish Civil War - only to resume intermittent progress in the 1950s. Construction passed the mid-point in 2010 with some of the project's greatest challenges remaining and an anticipated completion date of 2026 - the centennial of Gaudí's death.

The basilica has a long and divisive history amongst the citizens of Barcelona: over the fear that it might compete with Bercelona's cathedral, over Gaudi's design itself, over the possibility that work after Gaudi's death disregarded his design. Recently, the proposed high-speed rail link to France also brought up controversy over fears that it would disturb the basilica's stability.

Art critic Rainer Zerbst said of the basilica: "It is probably impossible to find a church building anything like it in the entire history of the art."

Pulitzer Prize winning architectural critic Paul Goldberger called it: "The most extraordinary personal interpretation of Gothic architecture since the Middle Ages."

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