NIAGARA FALLS — One of the challenges in a shuttered church is the danger posed to irreplaceable stained-glass windows.

No chance of that happening at the “new” Pro-Cathedral of St. George the Martyr, which recently reopened a historic house of worship at 1910 Falls St., a city landmark.

“It was in good condition,” said Archbishop Peter W. Goodrich, of the the Independent Anglican Church, Canada Synod. “There was a lot of blood, sweat and tears put into it. And it was just the right size, not bigger than we needed, providing a lovely place of worship and a way to reach out to the community.”

The St. George Church building was closed in 2008 as part of the Catholic Diocese of Buffalo parish reorganization, and the parish was folded into the new Divine Mercy Parish.

The Anglican church has brought it back to life.

Visitors still take inspiration from the magnificent stained-glass window of St. George slaying a fire-breathing dragon, today often interpreted as the conquest of human nature’s baser element.

“It’s magnificent when the sun comes through,” Goodrich said.

While many county residents have heard of St. George and the dragon—George is the patron saint of Boy Scouts — what’s often forgotten is that St. George was a soldier, martyred in what is now the city of Lod, Israel, more than 1,500 years ago. The brilliant, jewellike window at St. George the Martyr, shows him in armor, as a model of chivalry, said to have saved a young woman from that dragon.

Today, the new church that bears his name will look to save women in another way. It will provide a home for the Magdalene Project, which seeks to provide for prostitutes “a stable environment to learn about the love of Jesus,” said the Rev. Joanne Lorenzo, founder and director of the nonprofit organization. She’s assisted by the Rev. Anne Skinner on a project that is part of Lighthouse International Ministries.

There’s another armored knight at St. George’s, greeting congregants at the front of the church.

“I first thought he was St. George,” Goodrich said.

This knight turned out to be a symbol of Lithuania, near the four front Tuscan-style columns.

The church, with a 1927 cornerstone, was built by Lithuanians, the only Lithuanian Roman Catholic Church in the Buffalo Diocese, modeled after Vilnius Cathedral, the main Roman Catholic Cathedral of Lithuania’s Vilnius, one of the largest surviving medieval towns in Northern Europe.

St. George slaying the dragon is one of more than a dozen Gothic-revival stained-glass windows created by the famed Frohe family, an 1889 Paris Exposition medal-winner.

As light passes through the St. George windows, which includes one of St. Peter holding the keys to heaven, the stained glass seems to change with the time of day and weather.

“Even when the sky is dull, it’s marvelous,” Goodrich said.

In addition, there are more than a half-dozen arched windows, depicting saints including Augustine, who had a hand in the Anglican church—Anglican meaning “of England.” Pope Gregory the Great sent Augustine to Britain in the sixth century for the Celtic Christians.

“Augustine was surprised to see priests and bishops already there,” Goodrich said.

While many believe King Henry VIII created the Anglican church because he wanted a divorce, Anglicans say that divorce was just one of the issues that split the English church from the Roman church.

“The Church of England was there long before Henry,” Goodrich said.

During the Great Depression of more modern times, the Independent Anglican Church, Canada Synod, had its beginnings at the parish of St. John the Evangelist in Hamilton, Ont., as Niagara Anglican bishops took exception to use of incense and bells, among other practices.

“We are traditionalists,” Goodrich said of his denomination, which started in 1934. “We hold firmly to the belief that the Holy Scriptures contain all things necessary to salvation. We believe that the Scriptures are divinely inspired, but not that they were written by God himself.” He added, “We are, as Anglicans have ever been, traditionally, ready and willing to accept wide variations in the style of worship.”

St. George’s has started out with about 75 congregants and is assisted by the Rev. Bill Stott and Deacon Edward Becker.

Sunday services begin at 10:30 a. m.