The largest Neoclassical Roman Catholic Cathedral built by the International Irish diaspora in the 19th century, and the largest cathedral church in Canada. Begun as the dream of Bishop Michael Fleming (1792-1850) who became bishop 1829. He inherited a chapel holding 300 but needed to seat 10,000. Fleming made five round trips to England to obtain the land, after which the church took 14 years to build. The sermon at the opening in 1855 was preached by Archbishop John Hughes of New York, who returned home inspired to build St. Patrick's Cathedral. Exceptional stained glass windows by English, and French artists pre-date and survived the Great Fire of St. John's in 1892. The Basilica holds the best collection of neoclassical statuary in the western hemisphere by Hogan, Carew, Ghersi, and Aureli. The pipe organ is one of the largest in Canada with 4050 pipes and 66 stops, and speaks in an exceptional acoustic environment with 2.9 seconds of reverberation.