By Daniel Hartill,Staff Writer

LEWISTON – More than 1,000 people gathered Sunday to witness the pomp and pageantry of the city’s grandest church getting a promotion.

Saints Peter and Paul Church was inaugurated as the Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul.

Bishop Richard Malone, the leader of Maine’s Catholic church and the principal celebrant of the 5 p.m. Mass of Thanksgiving, called it “a miracle.”

“Who can doubt that this basilica reflects God’s beauty?” Malone said, stretching out his hands before the congregation Sunday. “We are celebrating faith tonight.”

The thanksgiving Mass was the climax of five days of events celebrating the church’s elevation to a minor basilica.

People began arriving two hours before the scheduled 5 p.m. start, reserving spaces among the front pews.

Diane Williams, whose grandfather led the basilica’s construction in the 1930s, arrived at 3:15 p.m. and her family was already there.

“I’ve been here so many times, but it’s still a thrill,” Williams said. “We don’t want to miss this.”

She was joined by people from across the region, lifelong parishioners, Catholics from other parishes and non-Catholics who are awestruck by the massive Gothic structure, which was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1983.

“I graduated from high school here,” said Bonnie Stone of Minot, an alumna of St. Dominic Regional High School. This was never her parish, but she wanted to witness the historic inauguration, she said.

She also felt the pull of her faith.

“I love Jesus,” she said.

By the time the Mass began, almost every pew was full. And the basilica’s full pageantry went on display. Anticipating the large crowd, church leaders erected a movie-style screen on one side of the nave, in case the columns blocked the spectacle.

There were 22 sword-carrying Knights of Columbus, each with capes and hats with plumes. There was procession of bishops and priests, and the soaring vocals of a 75-voice choir, including singers from several local churches in a new Basilica Choir and singers from the Portland’s Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception.

There were also new symbols of the church’s new status.

Amid the procession, two men hoisted a red and yellow parasol. Made in Rome and a traditional symbol kept in all basilicas, the “ombrellino” rose at least 10 feet into the air, decorated with gold fringe and topped with a gold cross.

It came to rest beside the pulpit, something that Malone joked about in his homily.

“You can’t miss it,” he said, waving to the brightly colored parasol before pointing out another traditional item, the “tintinabulum,” on his other side.

“That’s the bell on a stick,” the bishop said. On his left, the shining gold bell hung inside a sculpted, wooden handle. It stood about 6 feet tall.

Both are symbols of the basilica’s special link to the papacy.

“They remind us that we are part of a worldwide church,” Malone said.

The special recognition to Saints Peter and Paul has been years in coming.

The church applied in 1999 while the church was undergoing an extensive exterior restoration. The church’s upper sanctuary was renovated after that. Last fall, Cardinal Francis Arinzi, the Vatican’s prefect of divine worship and the discipline of the sacraments, gave his approval in the name of the pope.

Saints Peter and Paul becomes the first basilica in northern New England.

Bishop Joseph J. Gerry, who shepherded the church through the process, also attended Sunday’s event. Now bishop emeritus of the Maine diocese, he was one of the concelebrants of the Mass.

The basilica, which received that title on Oct. 4, received its new coat of arms at Sunday’s ceremony. The insignia includes a fleur-de-lis, in recognition of the French Canadian heritage of the people who built the church, which is the largest in Maine. The decree designating the basilica was read during the Mass in both French and English.

Now in semi-retirement, Gerry said he was “extraordinarily proud” of the recognition to the church.

And he talked of the building’s beauty.

Some things are too beautiful for words to adequately describe, he said.

“This is one of those places,” Gerry said.