Our Church

When you leave the Chapel you will find yourself in the East Transept.

The East Transept was built in 1914. In 2006, as part of our renewal of this space, pews were removed from the East Transept to create more flexible worship space, a kitchen, cloak room and washrooms built in the adjacent spaces.

You will generally see a large table set up here, as it is where we celebrate our Wednesday service Bread for the body, food for the soul (at 12:15 p.m.).

The East Window

In November 1939, on our 75th Anniversary, the present East window was unveiled and dedicated to the glory of God and in loving memory of the members of the congregation who died in World War I (1914–1919). You will find their names on a plaque on the wall in front of the window.

This window celebrates the “…angels and archangels and all the company of heaven” referred to by St. John the Divine in the Book of Revelation. Depicted here are our patron, St. James the Apostle, St. Michael the Archangel, captain of the hosts of heaven, St. George the Martyr, defender of the helpless and patron saint of soldiers, St. Stephen, the first martyr, and over all, the Lord of Glory presides: over his church and his world.

The Painting

Since the summer of 2010, and thanks to a generous gift from Saul Ettinger, a painting of The Virgin and Child Enthroned with Saints James and Lucy has hung in the East Transept. The painting, featuring our patron saint, is an altar piece from the early sixteenth-century and can be traced to a cloister in Bergamo. While the precise attribution remains conjectural, over forty years ago the renowned specialist Rodolfo Pallucchini compellingly proposed that the work was created by the local Bergamasque artist Agostino Facheris. The painting is, to our knowledge, the only work by Facheris in North America and one of the few outside of Bergamo. The handsome altarpiece has also been attributed by earlier scholars to the Venetian artist Lorenzo Lotto. It is a most generous and welcome addition to the church, certain to inspire worshippers in future generations, as it was originally intended.

Click here to go back to tour intro.

Click here to continue your visit inside the church with the Cloakroom.