St Sava Serbian Orthodox Cathedral (formerly Trinity Chapel)

A couple days ago, I wrote a piece on the first Orthodox liturgy in New York City, celebrated by Fr Agapius Honcharenko in 1865. The site of the liturgy was Trinity Chapel, which belonged to the Episcopal Church. In my post, I included a photo of Trinity Church… Which, as it turns out, is different than Trinity Chapel.

I learned of this from the archivist of Trinity Church, who informed me that what was Trinity Chapel is now St Sava Serbian Orthodox Cathedral.

Trinity Chapel originally belonged to Trinity Church. It was built in the 1850s, and despite being called a “chapel,” it had a considerable congregation. By the 1940s, though, demographics had changed, and church leaders decided to sell the building. New York City’s first full-blown Serbian parish had begun in the late 1930s, and as soon as they heard that the chapel was on the market, they were interested. With help from St Nicholai Velimirovich, Serbs from across the country, and the Episcopalians themselves, the modest Serbian parish was able to purchase Trinity Chapel in 1942. I’m getting all of this information from the website of St Sava Cathedral, and I would encourage you to take a look at the whole story, which can be found here.