History of the Cathedral

The "cathedral idea" was in the air at the time Henry Benjamin Whipple became Minnesota's first Episcopal bishop. James Lloyd Breck had written about it often in his letters. A cathedral was to be the Bishop's church at the center of institutions of learning and a network of ministry. When Whipple settled in Faribault, a parish church, two schools and several congregations in nearby villages had been started. In the spring of 1862, Mrs. Breck died and on July 16 Whipple laid the cornerstone of the Cathedral of Our Merciful Saviour, which was to be a memorial to her. According to Whipple, this was the first Episcopal church in the US to be built as a cathedral. Money was scarce, and it would not be completed and consecrated until June 24, 1869. Old Bishop Kemper, who would die the next year, was present. At the beginning the Cathedral was used by the schools--Shattuck, St. Mary's Hall, Seabury--as well as the Parish of the Good Shepherd. Whipple died in 1901 and was buried beneath the cathedral altar. The next year a tower with a peal of ten bells was dedicated in his memory. Whipple's successor, Samuel Cook Edsall, centered his work in Minneapolis; the "Bishop's Church," however, remained in Faribault until November 12, 1941, when St. Mark's, Minneapolis, became the cathedral though Our Merciful Saviour would continue to function as a cathedral. Today the Faribault Cathedral has an active congregation which sponsors several outreach programs.