As you drive past the motherhouse of the School Sisters of St. Francis near the corner of S. Layton Boulevard and Greenfield Avenue, you pass one of Milwaukee’s lesser-known historical landmarks – the St. Joseph Center Chapel. Consecrated on the feast day of St. Joseph (March 19) in 1917, the chapel is built in the Romanesque Revival style and features a number of artistic treasures. Built to seat 500 (the number of nuns who lived at the School Sisters’ convent during their heyday), the chapel is 200 feet long and 90 feet wide at its widest point with a spacious second-story gallery and choir loft. Some of the church’s impressive features include the numerous stained glass windows, seven ornate reliquaries containing fully documented relics of saints, and the mosaics that grace the sanctuary walls above the three altars.
A few of the chapel’s historic treasures merit special mention. The Carrara marble for the main altar was shipped from Italy during World War I. Given the danger of German U-boats, the shipment required the special authorization of President Woodrow Wilson. Murals depicting the seven sacraments adorn the walls of the sacristy to the right of the sanctuary. The murals are noteworthy both because a resident nun painted them and because she included portraits of local Milwaukeeans in her painting. To complete one’s tour, pass through the sacristy and visit the Chapel of Perpetual Adoration. Located directly behind the sanctuary of the main chapel, the Chapel of Perpetual Adoration features a revolving door so that a monstrance containing the Blessed Sacrament (a consecrated Communion wafer) may be seen from either the main chapel’s high altar on one side of the wall or above the adoration chapel’s altar on the other side.
The public is invited to attend Mass with the nuns as well as to tour the chapel at other times of the day. Visitors enter through the main lobby to the St. Joseph Center on S. Layton Blvd. The chapel may also be reserved for events and its acoustics are especially well-suited to choral singing. For Mass times and event scheduling, please contact Sr. Nedine Ferris at nferris@sssf.org or call (414) 385-5326. Those wishing to donate money toward the preservation of St. Joseph Chapel may call (414) 384-3334 or send their gift to:
International Office of Development
School Sisters of St. Francis
1501 South Layton Boulevard
Milwaukee, WI 53215
Sources:
In addition to consulting the websites cited above and the chapel brochure, I relied on the help of Sr. Mary Elma, Sr. Nedine Ferris, and Mr. Michael O’Loughlin, who were gracious enough to permit me to tour and photograph the chapel. I thank them for their hospitality and for sharing their knowledge of the chapel.
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