Seen from Stone Avenue, the church appears fixed in place. The white stucco facade, twin towers, and bronze statue of St. Augustine above the doors give it a sense of permanence.
That impression is misleading. The building behind that facade has gone through repeated cycles of demolition and reconstruction, so it does not belong to a single era.
The story reaches back to Tucson’s Catholic community of the 1860s and, more broadly, to a Spanish garrison chapel founded in 1776. An adobe church was built in 1868…