to hold that position. His interest in ecumenism led to the first-ever Palm Sunday service of reconciliation between Christians and Jews, held at the cathedral in 1986. At the service, called "From Fear to Friendship" and attended by approximately 1,200 guests, both Christian and Jewish, Hubbard "expressed contrition and remorse for the centuries of anti-Jewish hostility promulgated under the Church's auspices". Portal, a sculpture that stands just west of the building, commemorates the event. The diocese of Albany has given priests the permission to celebrate the Traditional Latin Mass since 1999. In June 2019, the diocese celebrated the 20th anniversary of the extraordinary form mass in the Albany diocese at a mass at St. Mary's Church. As of December 2016, there were 350,000 Catholics in the diocese. In September 2019, people affiliated with the now-closed St. Clare's Hospital in Schenectady, New York sued the Diocese, alleging that their pensions had gone unpaid. Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception At the first retreat he presided over, Bishop John McCloskey persuaded the assembled priests to pledge over five thousand dollars as the seed of a building fund. He commissioned Patrick Keely, an Irish immigrant himself, to design the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception. Over 10,000 watched on a rainy July day in 1848 as the church's cornerstone was laid. The final construction cost was $250,000 ($ in modern dollars). The cathedral was dedicated in 1852, and it opened for services thereafter. By 1858, the money was available to add a spire. The north tower was completed in 1862. Its height made it the city's tallest building for many years. Bells cast at the Meneely Bell Foundry in nearby West Troy (today Watervliet) were hung in the belfry and rung for the first time on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, December 8, 1862. The diocese was able to build the south tower's spire in 1888 and, four years later, the apse and sacristies. In 1902, on the 50th anniversary of the cathedral's opening, it was formally consecrated by Bishop Thomas Burke. In the 1920s, New York elected a Catholic, Al Smith, governor, the first one to be elected to that position in the history of the state. Living in the governor's mansion next door, he became a regular parishioner at the cathedral. In 1928, the year Smith ran unsuccessfully for president, his daughter Catherine was married in the cathedral. Following years of deterioration,