These Southwest Churches Have a HistoryPhotos/text by SANDI FAHY
San Felipe de Neri Parish in Albuquerque, New Mexico was constructed in 1793. It is the city's oldest Catholic parish and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The original church, which was started in 1706 and completed in 1718-19, collapsed during heavy rains the summer of 1792. The church that now stands on the Old Town Plaza was built in the shape of a cross the following year. Constructed of adobe, its walls are five feet thick.
 You will find The Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi in Santa Fe, New Mexico. The first church building was built in 1610, the year the city was founded. In 1630, the original adobe church was replaced by a larger one, only to be destroyed in the Pueblo Indian Revolt of 1680. The church that replaced it was not built until 1714. French architects and Italian stonemasons were brought in to construct a new Romanesque church in 1869. The Cathedral, which was made of stone and completed in 1887, was elevated to a Basilica by Pope Benedict XVI in 2005.
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