HOUGHTON – Building a chapel out of ice and snow was just a ‘fun idea’ until a small group of students at St. Albert the Great University Parish decided to give it a go in 2016.
The students got to work, shoveling, forming, and carving the first Ice Chapel.
They were soon surprised how quickly the word spread and how excited people were to come to such an event.
It became a yearly tradition, dubbed, “The Ice Mass at the Ice Chapel of Our Lady of the Snows,” or simply, “The Ice Mass.”
St. Albert the Great University Parish serves students, faculty and staff of Michigan Technological University and Gogebic Community College.
The Ice Chapel is built each year by college students and community members in the Keweenaw peninsula town of Houghton about four and half hours west of the Sault.
In a news release, organizers said for some students, the outdoor mass is the first mass they have ever attended, bridging Catholic and non-Catholic communities.
A mountain of snow; plywood forms held together with 2x4s; and a workforce of students, shoveling, bucketing, and stomping snow, brings the chapel to life.
Each year more students get involved in the build, and offer new creative dimensions, the parish said, noting the annual ice mass has gained international attention.
The chapel’s centerpiece, the altar, is built using thick slabs of ice, hand cut from Lake Superior (it’s quite an ordeal to get it in place, the parish says).
Built into the walls, one can find a raised pulpit, a Marian grotto, a hand-carved confessional, corridors along the sides, and beautiful ‘stained ice’ windows.
The priests at St. Al’s will celebrate three planned Ice Masses in the Our Lady of the Snows Ice Chapel, the first of which is live-streamed on Facebook: Feb 9 at 5:30 p.m.
You may visit mtucatholic.org/icemass to register for the link.
"St. Al’s parish is overjoyed each year to shovel together a creation that glorifies God and brings the community together through the Mass," organizers said.
When asked how much it costs to build an Ice Chapel, Father Ben Hasse simply responds “about a thousand dollars worth of pizza,” which fuels the student labor.
