Puebla Cathedral: consecrated in 1649 by the bishop who left the city eighteen days later

On the Zócalo of Puebla, in Mexico, the cathedral, dedicated to the Immaculate Conception, stands on an earlier, more modest building dating to 1536. Construction of the present church began in 1575 to a design by the architect Francisco Becerra, but the works stalled around the ’20s of the seventeenth century for lack of funds. The resumption of the building site is owed to Bishop Juan de Palafox y Mendoza, who arrived in Puebla in July 1640 with a royal decree ordering its completion. Palafox revived the works, contributing his own funds and organising collections, along with an increase in tithes that was among the causes of his clash with the Jesuits. The cathedral was consecrated on Sunday 18 April 1649, though, according to the Mexican National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), it was not yet fully completed: the towers and the main facade, known as the “Puerta del Perdón”, were finished only in the following years (the facade in 1664, the north tower in 1678, the south tower in 1768). Palafox left Puebla for Spain just eighteen days after the consecration, on 6 May 1649. His towers, between 69 and 74 metres tall according to different, unreconciled sources, are described as the tallest among the cathedrals of New Spain, surpassing those of Mexico City Cathedral. Inside, the floor of Santo Tomás marble was laid in 1772, while the central altar, known as “El Ciprés”, an octagonal canopy of Tecali marble about 17 metres tall, was built between 1797 and 1818 to a design by Manuel Tolsá, completed by the local architect José Manzo, and crowned by a gilded bronze sculpture of the Immaculate Conception. The largest bell, called “María”, was installed in the north tower in 1732. The building is part of the Historic Centre of Puebla, inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1987, where it is cited individually among the city’s main religious buildings, though this has not been directly verified against the official nomination text. The earthquake of 19 September 2017 caused cracks in the cathedral’s domes, including those near the choir and above the Altar of the Kings. According to statements by the cathedral’s rector reported by the local press, more than five years later that structural damage had still not been fully repaired, against only surface-level maintenance work. A further earthquake, in June 2020, caused a crack in the vault above the same Ciprés. In January 1979, during his first international trip as pontiff, John Paul II celebrated a mass in Puebla, but the ceremony was held at the Palafoxian Seminary, not inside the cathedral itself.