Spiritual Leader Plays Political Cards in Cathedral Fight

When Cardinal Roger M. Mahony threatens to build a new cathedral outside downtown Los Angeles, he sounds like a tough major league sports team owner playing hardball to get a new stadium.

At a press conference Monday in old St. Vibiana’s, on the fringe of skid row, Mahony laid out his conditions as forcefully as Al Davis, formerly of Los Angeles, and Art Modell, late of Cleveland, did before moving their National Football League teams.

It is clear the cardinal is holding most of the cards.

If, as Mahony threatens, a new cathedral to replace St. Vibiana’s is built in the Los Angeles suburbs or a city such as Glendale or Burbank, it would be a severe blow to city and state efforts to save the rundown and increasingly dangerous old section of downtown.

Threats to move didn’t add up to new stadiums for Davis and Modell. But as Los Angeles officials scurried to help Mahony and beat down conservationists opposed to his plan to raze St. Vibiana’s, the spiritual leader of Los Angeles’ Catholics appeared to have much more earthly political clout than even the hard-bitten sports entrepreneurs.

*

Mahony wants to build a new $45-million cathedral. He had favored tearing down St. Vibiana’s at 2nd and Main streets and building the new cathedral on the site.

But preservationists insisted that the old cathedral, or at least a substantial part of it, be saved. Negotiations have gone on for months but collapsed over the weekend when workers began tearing down the church’s bell tower. Stunned, the Los Angeles Conservancy obtained an emergency court order temporarily halting the demolition.

On Monday, the cardinal, famous for his explosive response to opponents, called a press conference. It was a great show by a media master in a town where media and hype are powerful forces in politics.

Mahony is a tall, thin man with a pleasant manner. But opponents remember emotional bruises from their past combat. When crossed, Mahony fires back with some of the most quotable rhetoric in town.

For his press conference, Mahony wore a hard hat, as did the other priests. We reporters had to wear them too, as well as signing a waiver promising we wouldn’t blame the archdiocese if we got beaned by a falling brick.

The church looked as though a hostile army had swept through, capturing the most prized possessions. Mahony stood near where the marble altar had been. Religious artifacts, he said, had been removed for safety. Only the delicate chandeliers remained from the 19th century sanctuary.

It’s the 19th century heritage that has stirred preservationists’ passion. Building such a large cathedral in then-small-town L.A. was an expression of faith in the city’s future and its growth from pueblo to metropolis, said Linda Dishman, executive director of the Los Angeles Conservancy.

But I think just as strong an argument can be made that Los Angeles’ most historic church is farther north on Main Street, near Olvera Street. La Placita church was founded in 1784, and the present sanctuary was completed in 1822.

At the press conference, nobody got into a discussion of the historical value of La Placita vs. St. Vibiana’s. But Mahony wasn’t much of a St. Vibiana’s booster.

Where, I asked, would you place St. Vibiana’s on a list of the world’s great cathedrals?

“Either last or next to last,” he said. “There may be one worse, but I can’t recall one.”

Afterward, he took us on a tour of the place. We saw bricks with crumbling mortar. The foundations were rubble. The sanctuary ceiling, he said, was held up by horsehair, a 19th century building material.

As we finished the tour, the message was clear: Only fervent prayer has prevented the old church from collapsing.

The show was not surprising for students of the cardinal. He hit hard. He had clear villains, the Los Angeles Conservancy and other preservationists. “A small group of obstructionists,” he called them.

Conservancy Executive Director Dishman said she was “taken aback” by the intensity of Mahony’s attack.

She shouldn’t have been. He fought just as hard when then-Mayor Tom Bradley and his allies opposed a major anti-gang program backed by Mahony. That battle resounded through local government for months.

This time, he has more allies. Councilwoman Rita Walters, an opponent on the gang issue, is on Mahony’s side. She represents downtown and wants the new cathedral there.

Walters’ habitual foe, Mayor Richard Riordan, is with her on this one. The mayor, an influential Catholic layman, is close friends with the cardinal.

Behind them are powerful business interests who feel the cathedral is needed to save old downtown. The area is in trouble. Plans to build a new concert hall near the Music Center have stalled. Old office buildings are empty. The cathedral was expected to be a centerpiece of revival.

In some cities, this could be fixed by a few quiet phone calls. In L.A., power is so divided you can’t figure out whom to go to for decisions. So public opinion--and the media--rule.

It was public dismay over destruction of our historic buildings that led to the laws protecting them. These laws are now interfering with Mahony’s plans.

But this is more than a legal question. It’s political. We can’t let downtown go down the drain. And neither can we blithely dispose of our history.

So with the cardinal holding all the cards, the preservationists are going to have to find a way to compromise with him.

Either that, or hold a better press conference.