James at CCC on altar placements in Milwaukee churches

The elegant beauty of most of Milwaukee’s historic Catholic churches has been captured in our gallery page. Stepping inside these sacred buildings is always a moving experience. Many were built by immigrants from Poland or Germany. These churches represent some of the city’s most impressive architectural heritage. Preservation of these local treasures should be a concern of everyone in Milwaukee. As so many popular restoration shows on television highlight, the preservation of historic homes and other buildings is the “in” thing to do. In addition to structural upkeep, a significant part of any restoration movement involves the peeling back of inconsistent and dated accretions that were added over the years. Looking back, it’s hard to believe that anyone would think concealing rich hardwood floors with green carpeting, for example, would be a good thing to do. But it was done, over and over again, in house after house. Maybe you’ve done some work in your old home and discovered something beautiful that was concealed for decades beneath layers of paint or carpeting.

continue at Cream City Catholic

A good post.  I've noted that here in La Crosse it's not just a Catholic problem, there's a general disregard for tradition - even the lower case t kind.  We've seen lots of these cases, I remember when I was digging through archives a bit more the egregious case of  St. Mary's of the Lake Catholic Church in Westport, WI.  It's good that we continue to recognize these poor decisions and the erroneous theology behind them.