Did you know? The Athenaeum of Ohio/Mount St. Mary’s Seminary of the West
The Athenaeum of Ohio/Mount St. Mary’s Seminary of the West forms laypeople and priests for ministry. The third oldest seminary in the U.S. and the oldest west of the Appalachian Mountains, it’s built of granite in the Lombard Romanesque style.
I looked forward to every day I went to the seminary for classes. The building is so beautiful and noble, it would be imposing were it not so inviting to the person who wishes to draw closer to God through studies, discernment and prayer.” – Deacon Nathan Beiersdorfer
THE SEMINARY HOUSES
6 MOSAICS
made in the Vatican workshops before 1910
1 MASSIVE PAINTING
people once stood in line and paid to see. “Christ’s Entry Into Jerusalem” by Benjamin Joseph Haydon (1820), includes the likenesses of William Wordsworth, Sir Issac Newton and John Keats. It long hung in the seminary gymnasium.
100,000+ ITEMS
in the Eugene H. Maly Memorial Library
19 CARVED FIGURES
on the main chapel’s wooden reredos (altarpiece).
14 STAINED GLASS WINDOWS
in the main chapel were designed by Karl Hackert Church Interiors and made in Austria in 1963.
1829
Cincinnati’s first seminary was founded by Bishop Edward Fenwick five years after his consecration as the first Bishop of Cincinnati.
1956
A fire destroyed the seminary’s south wing.
2019
Fenwick Hall addition blessed and dedicated.
CEDAR POINT
Original name of the seminary’s site in Mt. Washington
I want to thank the bishops and directors of vocations who send their men to study at Mount St. Mary’s. Their confidence in what we do here continually challenges us to work to improve and become more effective in our mission of forming priests, deacons and lay ecclesial ministers in the Church. – Father Anthony Brausch, Seminary Rector
The Author
