Cathedral of Our Lady of the Good Voyage

Be modern and represent new times in the Republican country. With this proposal, the city that was constructed could not coexist with a space and colonial constructions as was the camp of the Curral Del Rey and the old church made out of sticks and clay dedicated to Our Lady of the Good Voyage.

It was in this context that the Construction Commission of the New Capital decided to demolish the old cathedral, which began in 1912, to insert its old churchyard in the new urban network that was being built, and to erect a new modern cathedral, in the Neogothic style of the time, with a project by an unknown author. The Construction Commission justified that there was no condition to recover it, because there were no lack of protests from the population against the demolition of the centuries old church. The whole process lasted until 1921, when the new cathedral was ready. It was inaugurated in 1923, when Belo Horizonte was officially declared an Archbishopric.

Parts of the demolished cathedral were saved, for example: the Portuguese image of Our Lady of Good Voyage, in polychrome wood and with gilding, which is now on the right side altar; on the left side is the altar of the Sacred Heart of Jesus; the lavatory of the sacristy carved in soapstone, “where the central figure represents two dolphins, with tails up and interlaced and heads down from where water flows” in a basin resting on a column. The set is adorned with acanthus leaves, Voluta sea shells, glass beads, phytomorphic elements and conchoid forms. Dated 1793; the font, also sculpted in soapstone, being a hemispherical basin with decoration of embossed friezes, supported on column and cover of wood; altarpieces of the altars thus distributed: that of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, in the choir of the present church, that of Our Lady of Sorrows in the church of Our Lady of Graces of Ibirité and a third in the Museum of the Minas Gerais Conspiracy in Ouro Preto; and two bronze bells, of Portuguese manufacture, dated 1791 and 1818.

Inheritance of the II National Eucharistic Congress held in Belo Horizonte in 1936, is in the altarpiece of the high altar, crowned by a canopy of marble, surrounded by a set of six stained glass windows, the majestic tabernacle and monstrance made of silver and yellow silver , commonly known as tabernacle and custody.

The building has a Latin cross plan and has two levels; the first level begins with the entrance portico, the atrium having on the sides the baptistery and the tomb of Dom Cabral, the first Archbishop of Belo Horizonte. Next, one sees the nave with lateral corridors, with doors to the exterior, the transept (arms of the cross) with the lateral altars and the apse with the main altar. The second level has the choir and the grandstands.

In the volumetry stands the tower that, together with the dome and towers crowned by pinnacles, give rhythm, lightness and verticality to the building. The tower features trapezoidal, pointed cross, supporting the clock and the cross. The tower and the interior decoration of the nave and the high altar in stucco were designed by the architect João Morandi. The frontispiece features decorative masonry that gives it volumetry. The entrance porch is covered by vault and supported by thin columns. In addition to the stained-glass windows, rosette-shaped windows help in internal lighting.

The registration in the State Historical and Cultural Heritage, made by Iepha-MG, was on June 2, 1977, and contemplates the ensemble of the block that is composed of the gardens, the church, the Chapel of Saint Peter Julian Eymard, the parish house, the project of the architect Luís Signorelli, the lodging of the Nocturnal Adoration of the Holiest One and all the pieces of the cathedral demolished and already mentioned previously.