Saint Catherine of Alexandria Catholic Church is located on Santa Catalina Island, 20 miles off the coast of Los Angeles, California. The church building has been serving the city of Avalon since 1950, but our catholic history on the island begins much earlier when the first Catholic Mass was said on the island in the year 1602 by an Augustinian friar accompanying Spanish explorer, Sebastian Viscaino.
The first Catholic Church building on the island was dedicated in 1902 as “St. Mary, Star of the Sea” on Vieudelou Avenue, with Fr. P. F. Byrne as the first celebrant. When a larger property became available, a new sanctuary was built in 1950 on Beacon Avenue, where we stand to this day.
The main building and rectory were built first, and around a decade later, the parish hall and other auxiliary rooms were built to support and expand the parish.