St Francis of Assisi Church

Do you need to get married, have a baptism or just get your pray on? If so, you may want to check out St. Francis of Assisi.This beautiful old church is quite amazing. My most recent visit was to celebrate the baptism of one of my nieces. It was held after Sunday mass so I had to attend the full service. Because I arrived a bit late, I had to stand in the rear the entire time. Surprisingly the church was so beautiful that it didn't bother me at all. The altars and stained glass portraits are particularly beautiful and unlike anything you can find in a modern house of worship.The one drawback to this church is the parking situation. It's uptown so expect a lengthy walk.

What a joyous church for the wedding of friends' daughter. The ceiling of the apse of the church above the main altar is a beautiful sky blue. The apse with main altar and the crossing bays form the arms of the cross. The magnificent stained glass windows are from Munich, Germany and illustrate various scenes in the life of St. Francis of Assisi. The congregation has been restoring portions of the church with the floors and pews being one of the most recent projects.

This is a gorgeous church to visit in the Heart of New Orleans. Great for photos.

Went to their anniversary banquet and Mass a few years back. Snobby people. Met the archbishop, insulted him, and had a seizure promptly thereafter.

I will start by saying, this church is absolutely beautiful. Unfortunately, this is the only positive thing I can say. The staff is completely unprofessional and extremely rude. My now husband and I recently got married here and it was nothing short of a nightmare. They kept having us write checks for additional "fees" on top of what was outlined as totals due within their handbook. While at our rehearsal - they tried saying we hadn't paid the wedding coordinator fee in front of our wedding party and families. Earlier that week, we received a return check, so if there was something else owed why would we have received that? If there was any concern about a payment, the professional and appropriate thing to do would be pull one of us aside and discuss the matter privately not in front of the entire party and family. Also for the rehearsal, the coordinators waited until a few weeks prior to inform us they had a wedding booked for the Friday night and we either had to hold the rehearsal a day earlier or earlier in the afternoon on Friday than we had already planned. We were told it was because there was paperwork that was not completed on time, however all the paperwork that was requested was turned in and we had copies of everything. The majority of our family members and wedding party were traveling from out of town and had to scramble making last minute travel arrangements that had been booked months in advance. During the rehearsal planning process, the coordinators were never polite about anything. They snapped at our wedding party and acted as though our rehearsal was a bother for them. It made our wedding party so uncomfortable that they even brought it up to us after the fact and felt as though they were somehow in the wrong. This is a joyous occasion and the church did nothing but complicate this already stressful process and make us jump through hoops to be married in this establishment. We met with the music director with questions about some of the songs contained in the handbook that the church gives to couples to be married within their establishment. The director informed us that we could choose whichever songs we wanted, that we were not limited to the list provided. This was very confusing for us that the music director told us one thing and the coordinators told us something completely different. We just wanted to do things correctly, but even the church couldn't communicate with its own staff let alone paying customers. The final straw - wedding day. We paid additional fees to have a violinist and pianist play for the ceremony. We selected music as directed from the church's handbook. A song for the seating of the mothers / grandmothers, a bridal party song and of course the bridal precession. The church and music director decided to play their own selection the entire time. As the bride, I expected the song to change for me to walk down the aisle. The coordinator told me to just walk to the same song as the bridal party did before me. I politely told her the song I selected and she rudely said she would change it. The song changes to yet another one of the music director's songs of choice (which was not a bridal or even wedding song at all). The coordinator told me to "JUST DEAL WITH IT, AND WALK". I'm not sure why they had us select music at all, if they knew they would only play song selections of their choice. It honestly saddens me to have to ever leave a negative review about a church of all places. However, the actions of the staff were the most un-Godly that I have experienced in a while. Since we can't redo the day, this review is the only thing I feel I can do to prevent anyone else from dealing with this staff during an already stressful time. The stress and embarrassment that resulted from dealing with this church isn't worth the beauty it contains.