Cathedral of Christ the Light
The Cathedral of Christ the Light also called the Oakland Cathedral, is the cathedral of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Oakland in Oakland, California. It is the seat of the Bishop of Oakland. Christ the Light, the first cathedral built in the twenty-first century, replaces the Cathedral of Saint Francis de Sales, irreparably damaged in the Loma Prieta earthquake of 1989.
Located on Lake Merritt adjacent to downtown Oakland, at the corner of Grand Avenue and Lakeside Drive, the cathedral serves as mother church of approximately 530,000 professed Catholics in the counties of Alameda and Contra Costa.
Christ the Light, as a larger Cathedral Center, is composed of the cathedral church, chancery offices of the bishop's curia, diocesan conference center, rectory (priest residence), health services center (which provides free diagnostic services to people without health insurance), and a mausoleum. The mausoleum features twelve crypts reserved for the bishops of Oakland and burial sites available to the members of the diocese for a comparable price to the other Catholic cemeteries in the diocese. The Cathedral Center also houses a cafe and bookstore, as well as a public plaza and garden.
The Cathedral of Christ the Light provides a sanctuary in the broadest sense of the word, this house of worship offers a sense of solace, spiritual renewal, and respite from the secular world. The Cathedral employs a non-linear approach to honour the church’s 2,000-year history without forcing a specific point of view. By stripping away received iconography, the design positions symbolic meaning within contemporary culture. The approachable result remains open to the region’s ever-changing multi-cultural makeup and to the future.
Originally planned in 2000 under the direction of Bishop John Stephen Cummins ground was broken in 2005, Christ the Light was consecrated and dedicated by Bishop Allen Henry Vigneron in 2008. On All Souls' Day, the mausoleum was also dedicated with the first Bishop of Oakland, Floyd Lawrence Begin, being reburied in one of its crypts.
Design
The Catholic Cathedral Corporation of the East Bay instituted a design competition for Christ the Light. Various designs were judged and the corporation announced Santiago Calatrava, of Valencia, Spain as the winner. Calatrava's design for Christ the Light was chosen before a site was even appropriated for the project. By the time a site was chosen which was a parking lot formerly dedicated to the construction of the tallest building in Oakland, Calatrava's design fell out of favour and was instead replaced by a design of competition runner-up Craig W. Hartman, FAIA of Skidmore, Owings and Merrill offices in San Francisco.
Hartman, designer of the international terminal at San Francisco International Airport, created a 20th century abstract building from the family of styles developed by architects like Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, famous for creating steel shapes filled with glass. Hartman's vision for Christ the Light was likened to the image of a bishop's mitre, shaped by steel and filled with glass frit.
Craig Hartman, says he “could not imagine a more important commission than to design a cathedral.” Cathedrals of this magnitude are not often built, so to be chosen to build one among many other qualified architects is truly an honour. The Diocese’s main focus for the design was its use of day lighting. Hartman proposed that light would be the key “to create a contemporary design that was still evocative of the Church’s two millennium-old traditions.”
To achieve this heavenly goal, Hartman consulted his retired SOM partner, Walter Netsch, who designed the 1950s Cadet Chapel at the U.S. Air Force Academy, which is also well known for its use of light. SOM’s Cathedral goes against the classical design of cathedrals and basilicas, which take the form of a cross with the altar placed at the intersection. Hartman wanted a more modern structure that embodied the community, so they placed the altar in the center surrounded by seating.
Circular motifs play an important role in the design, especially the outside structure, which funnels up 12 stories towards a glass oculus roof. The skylight focuses light onto the center altar, allowing views of the sky, and is also part of the unique passive cooling system. The system uses natural convection to cool air as it rises up through floor vents and out through openings in the oculus. Additional sustainable features of the building include the extensive use of natural light to cut back on energy use during the day. The structure’s concrete was formed using fly ash and contributes thermal mass for heating and cooling.
Worship space
The worship space in Christ the Light is a vesica pisces shape (translated into English means fish bladder), the shape formed by the intersection of two circles. The walls are composed of overlapping panels of wood and glass rising skyward to form the vault, much like the scales of a fish. The design was inspired by the miracle of the loaves and the fish in Christian tradition, among other motifs.
The Oakland Tribune wrote of the Hartman's description of light, "The design allows light to filter in, reminiscent of how light filters through a canopy of tall redwood trees in a wooded glade, Hartman said”. The cathedral has an area of 226,000 square feet with 13 storeys, a height of 135 feet and occupies 2.50 acres.
Garden on the Church grounds
A small garden on Christ the Light's grounds serves as a place of healing for survivors of clergy sexual abuse. Designed by a survivors' group in collaboration with the Oakland diocese, the garden features a basalt sculpture and a plaque inscribed "We remember, and we affirm: never again."
The structure’s concrete makes use of ash and slag, a waste byproduct of coal combustion and steel production, to reduce the amount of cement, a resource-consuming material.An advanced version of the ancient Roman technique of thermal inertia maintains the interior climate with mass and radiant heat, obtained through a sustainable harvesting process, has proven to be aesthetically pleasing, economically sound, and structurally forgiving-the wood’s surfaces adding warmth.
Its elasticity allows for the bending and returning of shape during seismic activity. Through the use of advanced seismic techniques, including base isolation, the structure can withstand another 1,000-year earthquake. The Cathedral of Christ the Light, a building for the ages, will endure for centuries rather than decades.
Structural System
The main Cathedral superstructure consists of a hybrid structural system of reinforced concrete, pre-fabricated glued laminated wood timber members, high-strength structural steel rods paired with glued laminated wood compression struts, and a steel friction-pendulum seismic base isolation system. The superstructure is supported atop an eighteen-foot-high mausoleum substructure of reinforced concrete extending to a reinforced concrete mat foundation.
Awards
- According to Peter Ruggiero the design partner at skidmore,Owing &Merrill LLP the cathedral of Christ church has won the following awards:-
- 2003 AIA - San Francisco Chapter • Unbuilt Design Award
- 2007 American Concrete Institute - Northern California and Western Nevada Chapter • Regional Architecture Award for Use of Concrete
- 2008 California Construction Magazine • Outstanding Architectural Design
- 2008 California Construction Magazine • Overall Top Project
- 2008 McGraw-Hill Construction • Best of the Best Award
- 2008 treehugger.com • "Ten of the World's Most Beautiful Green Buildings"
- 2008 Wallpaper Magazine • Best Building Site of the Year
- 2008 Wood Design & Building Magazine • Wood Design Awards: Honor Award
- 2009 AIA • National Honor Award for Architecture
- 2009 AIA - East Bay • Honor Award
- 2009 AIA - San Francisco Chapter • Excellence in Architecture: Honor Award
- 2009 International Interior Design Association • Interior Design Award
- 2009 WoodWorks • California Wood Design Award: Landmark Category
Professional Team
Designer
Skidmore Owings & Merrill LLP (SOM)
Client
Diocese of Oakland
Associate architect
Kendall/Heaton Associates Inc.
Structural engineering
Skidmore, Owings & Merrill
General contractor
Webcor builder
