Svētā Jēkaba katedrāle

Svētā Jēkaba katedrāle is a Roman Catholic cathedral in Riga, Latvia, dedicated to Saint James the Greater. It stands in Old Riga, directly opposite the House of the Livonian Noble Corporation. That building houses Latvia’s parliament, while the cathedral forms part of the Old Riga UNESCO World Heritage Site. The church is the smallest of Riga’s four old-town churches.

Construction began in 1225 and ended around 1330, giving the early Gothic building a long civic and religious history. At the start of the fifteenth century, the Holy Cross Chapel joined its southern end. Reformation sermons in 1522 and 1523 made it Riga’s second German-language and first Latvian-language Lutheran church. Jesuits received it in 1582, and Swedish rule returned it to Lutherans in 1621. Later congregations worshipped in Swedish, German, and Estonian, before Catholic use returned after the 1923 referendum.

Napoleon’s troops stored flour and other food inside the church in 1812. During that period, services moved to St. Peter’s Church from June through November. The medieval character survives most clearly in the belfry, whose features recall Riga churches before the Reformation. John Paul II visited in 1993, followed by Pope Francis in 2018.