Where the Lot Has Always Been Sacred Ground
The corner of Grand and Marin in downtown Jersey City has been set apart for Christian worship for over two centuries, longer than the United States has existed. In 1804, when the Associates of the Jersey Company hired surveyor Joseph F. Mangin to map the swampy waterfront tract of Paulus Hook, four lots at the highest and driest point of the survey were marked "church grounds," the only sites named on the entire original map. As historian Barbara Petrick explains, the founders assumed it would be the churches that anchored civilization, bringing schools and decent citizens in their wake. Four congregations eventually rose on those donated lots, and the third of them, a Gothic Revival brownstone completed in 1857, is now Saints Peter and Paul Orthodox Cathedral, the home of one of the oldest Slavic Orthodox parishes in New Jersey.
The parish itself is the second oldest Slavic Orthodox community in the state, founded in 1907 by immigrants from what is now Slovakia and Ukraine and from the Russian Empire. They had organized under a December 1889 charter as the Saints Peter and Paul Brotherhood, gathering first in a wooden building on Chestnut Street and then in a brick church at Greene and Sussex Streets, where they worshipped as Eastern Rite Catholics under the Byzantine liturgical rite. When pressure mounted to replace that rite with more Latinized forms, roughly five hundred congregants withdrew. They would not surrender the ancient traditions their families had carried from the old country. Within months they were holding services in rented house churches on Grand Street, and on February 16, 1907, they incorporated as "Saints Peter and Paul Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Church of Jersey City." The first Divine Liturgy was celebrated on October 24, 1907, by Archpriest Alexander Hotovitsky at his 64 Grand Street residence.
The Building That Became a Cathedral
Within a year the congregation had outgrown its rented rooms. In February 1909 the Russian Orthodox Archdiocese in America purchased the former First Reformed Church on Grand Street for $35,000 from the Collegiate Reformed Church of New York City, which had held the mortgage since the 1850s. The cut-stone Gothic sanctuary that the Dutch Reformed had built on this lot between 1853 and 1857 would now be transformed into an Orthodox church.
The building was a remarkable structure to begin with. The cornerstone was laid in 1853 by the Dutch Reformed congregation, and the original architect, John W. Welch of Brooklyn, was replaced after a dispute and cost overruns by Detlef Lienau, a Danish-born architect trained in Germany and Paris who became one of the founders of the American Institute of Architects. The completed church, dedicated April 5, 1857, was built of brown sandstone from Belleville and Little Falls in what the New York Times described as "perpendicular Gothic of the Twentieth Century." Its nave stretched forty-eight feet high and thirty feet wide beneath an open-timbered roof. The 106-by-70-foot structure held ten stained-glass windows, 128 pews for 750 persons, gas lights, and ten arches on eight columns. Final costs doubled the original estimate, making it the most expensive church then standing in Jersey City.
Lienau's 1857 frame survives in the nave today. What the new owners did was transform the interior. On July 7, 1909, a hand-carved solid oak Iconostasis was purchased for $1,200. Its center Royal Doors with icons and red curtains were modeled after those at Saint Nicholas Cathedral in New York City, and its oil-painted icons on canvas were imported from Russia. The exterior was transformed alongside: the two corner towers, capped originally in the Gothic style, were crowned with three Russian-style cupolas, copper domes, and Orthodox three-bar crosses. What the Dutch Reformed had built as a cut-stone Gothic sanctuary was now unmistakably an Orthodox church, its domes visible across the rooftops of Paulus Hook.
Seventy Murals and a Chandelier of Forty-Five Thousand Crystals
Between 1920 and 1940, the third permanent rector, Very Rev. John J. Adamiak, shaped the interior that visitors see today. Born in 1889 in Mayfield, Pennsylvania, Adamiak had been sent to seminary in Russia at age fourteen, hand-selected by Bishop Tikhon, the future Patriarch of Moscow. He returned to complete his training in Minneapolis and was ordained in 1911 as one of the first American-born Orthodox priests. He arrived at Saints Peter and Paul in 1920 and remained for twenty years, serving concurrently as Dean of all Orthodox parishes in New Jersey for most of that tenure.
Adamiak's lasting contribution was the commission of Photius Bodasiuk, an iconographer from Kiev who spent three years painting the more than seventy murals that cover the nave ceiling and walls. A new spruce ceiling had modified the former trusses to allow for overhead painting, and Bodasiuk filled that space with images that turned the Gothic structure into something unmistakably Orthodox. A professional art dealer later valued the complete mural program at $136,000.
During the same period, three church bells were installed in the towers, donated by parish members and sounding the musical notes A, C-sharp, and E. The great center chandelier, containing over 45,000 pieces of Czechoslovakian crystal, was funded by the entire congregation together. Smaller chandeliers of matching design illuminate the side aisles. The well-worn dark wood pews, still in place today, remain from the original Dutch Reformed Church. When Adamiak died suddenly in active service in December 1940 at the age of fifty-one, he had reduced the parish debt to $11,000 and left a building transformed.
The Two Recutors Who Shaped the Twentieth Century
Mitred Archpriest John Skvir served from 1952 to 1987, the longest rectorship in the parish's history at thirty-five years. His tenure encompassed the granting of autocephaly to the Orthodox Church in America in 1970, the moment when the North American Church received full canonical self-governance from the Moscow Patriarchate. Skvir's most consequential contribution to American Orthodoxy lay beyond Jersey City: he was the only individual who participated in all the preliminary negotiations leading to the OCA's autocephaly, and then traveled to Moscow in May 1970 as part of the official seven-member delegation to receive the Tomos of Autocephaly from the Moscow Patriarchate. He was blessed with a fine baritone voice and was known as a demanding standard-setter for choral excellence in worship. After his death, the Skvir-Buketoff Liturgical Music Collection, comprising four boxes of Orthodox scores published between 1819 and 1950, was donated to the Georges Florovsky Library at Saint Vladimir's Seminary.
His successor, Protopresbyter Daniel Hubiak, served from 1988 to 1991, but his career was already one of the most consequential in OCA history. He was the only person in OCA history to hold all three senior officer positions: Treasurer from 1963, Secretary from 1970, and Chancellor from 1973 to 1988. He had been one of the seven delegates who received the Tomos of Autocephaly in Moscow in May 1970. From Jersey City, he and parishioner Alexander Dorman launched the Russia Help Project, a monthly humanitarian airlift of clothing, medicines, food, and school supplies routed directly to a parish north of Moscow, deliberately bypassing governmental channels. After leaving Jersey City, Hubiak became the first OCA Representative to the Moscow Patriarchate, personally oversaw the restoration of the Church of Saint Catherine the Great Martyr on Bolshaya Ordynka in Moscow, and oversaw an OCA agreement to ship 12,000 tons of food to Russia in partnership with the USDA.
Restoration, the Centennial, and Elevation to Cathedral
Mitred Archpriest Joseph Lickwar served from 1991 to 2023, thirty-two years during which the building underwent its most substantial restoration since Adamiak's era. The parish received matching grants from the New Jersey Historic Trust for a three-phase, $1.1 million restoration from 2000 to 2006, returning the church to its 1924 appearance in time for the centennial in 2007. The Historic Trust described the building as "a rare historical document and architectural expression of immigration and cultural assimilation." The centennial year's conclusion was marked in stone and gold: in 2009 the parish's name was installed in gold letters across the sandstone facade. Archbishop Michael was consecrated at the cathedral in 2010, and on December 6, 2020, the Feast of Saint Nicholas, he elevated Saints Peter and Paul to cathedral status, making it the third OCA cathedral in the Diocese of New York and New Jersey, alongside Holy Protection in Downtown Manhattan and Holy Transfiguration in Brooklyn.
The building stands today as a Contributing Resource of the Paulus Hook Historic District, listed on the State and National Register of Historic Places since 1982. Its exterior bears the Gothic arches of Lienau's 1857 design, the three copper domes added in 1909, the teak doors with a carved Orthodox cross imported from Hong Kong in 1965, and the gold-lettered parish name added in 2009. Inside, the Bodasiuk murals from the 1920s and 1930s still cover the walls and ceiling, the 45,000-crystal chandelier still runs the length of the center aisle, and the 1909 iconostasis still divides the altar from the nave. The building is both a working church and a museum of the immigrant story that created it.
A Founding Saint on the Iconostasis
The first rector of this parish is now in the calendar of saints. Archpriest Alexander Hotovitsky served only through the founding year of 1907, yet his name is venerated across the Orthodox world. He had spent eighteen years building the institutional foundations of Orthodox Christianity in America, raising 80,000 rubles from donors on two continents to build Saint Nicholas Cathedral on East 97th Street in Manhattan, editing the Russian Orthodox American Messenger for its entire run, and surviving a bomb package and a physical assault while preaching in Bayonne, New Jersey. After his work in North America, he returned to Russia, where the Bolsheviks arrested him and shot him in August 1937 after years of imprisonment. In 1994, the Russian Orthodox Church and the Orthodox Church in America jointly glorified him as a New Martyr and Confessor of Russia. His icon now stands on the first tier of the iconostasis of the rebuilt Christ the Savior Cathedral in Moscow. In Jersey City, the City Council designated one block of Grand Street in front of the cathedral as "Saint Alexander Hotovitzky Way" on December 2, 2007, timed to the centennial of his first liturgy at 64 Grand Street.
His immediate successor, Rev. Alexander Nemolovsky, set a different kind of precedent. The first permanent resident rector, he lived at 131 Grand Street for $25 per month, supervised the purchase of the 1857 brownstone for $35,000, obtained the hand-carved oak iconostasis for $1,200, and signed the parish's Certificate of Incorporation in August 1909. Within months, the Holy Synod elected him the first vicar bishop of the North American Archdiocese. In February 1919, at St. Theodosius Cathedral in Cleveland, the Second All-American Sobor elected him Archbishop of the Aleutians and North America by secret ballot, the first election of an Orthodox primate by clergy and laity together in the Western Hemisphere, a democratic precedent by which the Orthodox Church in America has governed itself ever since. Appointed Archbishop of Brussels and Belgium in 1936, he was arrested by forty Gestapo officers immediately after Divine Liturgy on November 4, 1940, handcuffed before his congregation, and imprisoned in Berlin for the duration of the war. Released in 1945, he returned to Brussels, established two nursing homes for Russian refugees, and served daily liturgy into his eighties. He died on April 11, 1960, the Monday of Holy Week.
The Faith the Parish Confesses
The Orthodox Church in America traces its origins to the arrival in Kodiak, Alaska of eight Orthodox missionaries from the Valaamo Monastery in 1794. Today it numbers some 700 parishes, missions, communities, monasteries, and institutions throughout the United States, Canada, and Mexico. The cathedral belongs to the Diocese of New York and New Jersey, under Archbishop Michael.
The parish confesses the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed of 381: one God, Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth; one Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son, begotten of the Father before all ages, Light of light, true God of true God, begotten not made, of one essence with the Father; and the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the Giver of Life, who proceeds from the Father, who with the Father and the Son together is worshipped and glorified. The Church is one, holy, catholic, and apostolic, acknowledging one baptism for the remission of sins, looking for the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come.
The seven holy mysteries are Baptism and Chrismation, Confession, the Eucharist, Marriage, Ordination, and Unction. Children are baptized, chrismated, and given communion as full members of the Church from the beginning. Holy Communion is received by Orthodox Christians who have prepared through fasting, prayer, and the sacrament of confession. The parish takes its cue from the words of St. Ignatius of Antioch, who wrote on his way to martyrdom in 108 AD that the Eucharist is "the medicine of immortality, and the antidote to prevent us from dying, but which causes that we should live for ever in Jesus Christ."
Worship on Grand Street
The rhythm of the week is set by three regular services. Great Vespers is sung every Saturday at 5:00 PM, a forty-five-minute evening prayer of the Church that opens the Sunday. The Divine Liturgy is celebrated every Sunday at 9:30 AM. The service runs about an hour and thirty minutes, and most of it is sung or chanted by the choir in English, with some Greek and Slavonic. Visitors will smell incense and see the clergy process with the Gospel and the holy gifts. Bulletins are available at the entrance with the day's readings and hymns. Holy Communion is received by Orthodox Christians who have prepared through fasting and confession. Those who are not Orthodox are welcome to receive the antidoron, the blessed bread distributed at the end of Liturgy. Bible Study is held on Wednesdays at 8:00 PM.
The Divine Liturgy itself is the most ancient Christian service still in continuous use. It consists of two great halves: the Liturgy of the Word, with antiphons, the Little Entrance with the Gospel, the readings of Epistle and Gospel, the homily, and the litanies; and the Liturgy of the Faithful, with the Great Entrance, the Creed, the Anaphora where bread and wine are offered to be sanctified as the Body and Blood of Christ, the Lord's Prayer, Holy Communion, and the dismissal. The full service book, with rubrics and musical settings, is available for use during the service.
The Choir and the Concert Series
Music has always been central to the worship at Saints Peter and Paul. The choir is led by Music Director Gleb Ivanov, First Prize laureate of the Young Concert Artists International Auditions in 2005, who began his work at the cathedral on the same day that Fr. Solomon Longo was assigned as rector, Pentecost, June 1, 2023. In 2024, the parish launched the Saints Peter and Paul Concert Series in partnership with the Blüthner School of Music in Hoboken, bringing programs of Rachmaninoff, Brahms, Debussy, Fauré, and Schubert into the cathedral nave, with proceeds supporting the music program. The cathedral also hosts evenings of Byzantine and Slavic sacred chant, with the cathedral choir joined by invited singers from the diocese.
Children, Women, Men, and the Wider Parish
The parish runs a full program of formation and fellowship. Children's Sunday Lessons meet during the Sunday Liturgy, with short lessons for ages 2 to 13. First-Saturday classes for kids and teens gather at 3:30 PM, with pizza at 4:30 and Vespers at 5:00, with parking available in the York Street lot. A Nativity Season Children's Choir meets after Liturgy during the winter months. A monthly Women's Group gathers for silent prayer, then a Remembrance, a Report, and a Recognition shared among the women of the parish. A monthly Men's Group meets for prayers, a short reflection, and a conversation about what they are thankful for, where they have found traction, and where they are at a dead end. A Catechesis Series is offered for adults exploring Orthodoxy, and Bible Study meets on Wednesdays. Coffee Hour follows every Sunday Liturgy in the parish hall, and a summer picnic in the park, a winter party at the rectory, a summer movies night, and an inter-parish association picnic round out the year.
Fr. Solomon and the Current Chapter
Father Solomon Longo was assigned as Acting Rector on June 1, 2023, and was named Rector a year later. He succeeded Mitred Archpriest Joseph Lickwar, who had served the parish for thirty-two years. Fr. Solomon is a native of North Carolina; his father grew up in New Jersey, raised Catholic, and converted to the Baptist church after relocating south, a generation later, in what Fr. Solomon calls a twist of providential irony, his son returned to Jersey as an Orthodox priest. He trained at St. Tikhon's Orthodox Theological Seminary in South Canaan, Pennsylvania, where he graduated with a Master of Divinity degree. Archbishop Michael ordained him to the diaconate on January 29, 2022, and to the priesthood on January 21, 2023, both ordinations at St. Tikhon's Monastery. As a deacon he concelebrated the Hierarchical Divine Liturgy at the cathedral's 115th anniversary on October 30, 2022, alongside Archbishop Michael and Fr. Lickwar, a service that, in retrospect, looks very much like a deliberate introduction between a seminary deacon and the parish he would lead. He and Matushka Anna arrived at the rectory at 109 Grand Street with their five sons. Their family has since grown to seven children.
Fr. Solomon's pastoral introduction to the parish reads: "I am glad you found us. If you have never been inside an Orthodox church, you might feel a little lost your first time, and that is completely fine. Come on a Sunday, sit, observe. If you have questions afterward, I would genuinely like to talk." His vision is plain: he hopes to see the cathedral grow in the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and he believes that following Christ offers nothing less than our most free, fulfilled, and complete life in a world set right.
Planning a Visit
The cathedral is at 109 Grand Street, on the corner of Grand and Marin in Paulus Hook, a short walk from the Grove Street PATH station. The 10 and 87 buses stop on Grand Street. A gated lot across from the church is open Sundays for parishioners and visitors; street parking is also available nearby. The parish office is open on Wednesdays from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM. Visitors are always welcome, and modest, respectful attire is the only guidance given. There is no strict dress code. Women traditionally cover their heads inside the church, though it is encouraged and never required. Men typically remove hats before entering. Families with children are welcome, and there is a small area near the back if you need space.
If it is your first time, Sunday Liturgy is the natural place to start. Vespers on Saturday evening is shorter and quieter, about forty-five minutes, and a good introduction if you want to ease in. For anyone who wants to talk before visiting, Fr. Solomon is glad to speak with inquirers, and the cathedral's contact form allows visitors to introduce themselves online, share a little about their background, and ask any questions they have. As the parish puts it, "we do not ask you to believe before you belong. Come, observe, and ask questions freely."