Underground Cathedral

The great salt mountain of Zipaquira, 31 miles north of Bogota, has been mined for 400 years and still looks good for 1,000 more. On working days, the mine is a clangorous labyrinth where dynamite blasts are fired, power shovels snort, trucks rumble along black,*glittering galleries as high as five-story houses. This week the mine was silent as the miners observed the holidays. But on Christmas Eve, they would troop back to the hillside entrances with their families, and plod 2,600 ft. down into the mountain. There, for the first time, they were to hear Father Luis Posada, mine chaplain, say Midnight Mass in the great underground church, only one of its kind in the world, which the miners carved out of solid salt rock.

The natural development of the mine formed most of the church. Over the years, three narrow tunnels. 70 ft. high, were driven parallel to each other for 500 ft. Eight short cross-tunnels of the same height were then driven at right angles to the main shafts. The result: a central nave lined with two rows of eight huge columns, and flanked by an aisle on each side. The vaulted appearance, where the arched tunnels crossed, readily suggested a cathedral to many visitors. The idea took hold, and three years ago the Bank of the Republic, which operates the Zipaquira mines, assigned Architect Jose Maria Gonzalez Concha to finish part of the galleries as a church.

Gonzelez did not try to convert his rough-walled cavern into a conventional church interior. At the inner end of the parallel tunnels, where the final cross.-shaft formed an end wall, he mined out an apse --a rounded cave in line with the nave. He paved the innermost 150 ft. of the nave and aisles, wainscoted the wall and pillars in brick or limestone.

From the nave, Gonzalez built steps to the altar, a massive table of bricks. High in the apse, stark against the black salt, he set a 20-ft. cross made of thick, wooden poles. Last week, in preparation for the Christmas service, the miners were putting a finishing touch on their church: a 2,200-ft. tunnel to the mountain slope, which will provide a reassuring pinpoint of daylight for nervous visitors.

-In its natural state, the 90%-pure salt is discolored by slate.

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