East Liberty Presbyterian Church

The massive tower of East Liberty Presbyterian Church rises above almost everything else in East Liberty, even competing with the Highland Building. The design is by Ralph Adams Cram, arguably America’s greatest Gothic architect.

Stained Glass in Beechview

The Good Shepherd window at the rear of Holy Trinity Lutheran Church on Beechview Avenue, Beechview. The church building is a century old this year.

St. Bernard in Mount Lebanon

You can tell St. Bernard’s congregation is a community of well-off business types, because the church’s Web site has both a mission statement and a page of “goals and objectives.” But the building itself is quite beautiful, especially its gloriously colorful tile roof. The architect was William R. Perry, who also designed, on a somewhat smaller scale but with equally splendid taste, the bandstand in West End Park. These pictures were taken from the Mount Lebanon Cemetery.

Click on the picture to enlarge it.

Grace Lutheran in Troy Hill

The narrow streets and sudden drops in Troy Hill make for some unusual adaptations. Stuffed into a tiny lot, Grace Lutheran Church is as tall as it is long, with its main sanctuary on the second floor. It’s impossible to get a picture of the building without wires in front, and removing the wires with an image editor would be dishonest, which is Father Pitt’s way of saying “too much work.”

God and Mammon

The spire of Trinity Cathedral is dwarfed by the massive Oliver Building behind it, one of Daniel Burnham’s greatest gifts to Pittsburgh.

Trinity Cathedral is half a block up Sixth Avenue from the Wood Street subway station.