Finding Sacramental Records

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Obtaining Records from a Parish

• Your name at birth
• Date of birth
• Date of baptism (if known)
• Mother’s name (including maiden name)
• Father’s name

1. Assuming you are looking for your baptismal certificate, did you ever receive First Communion, Confirmation, or Matrimony in the Catholic Church? Parishes celebrating these other sacraments are supposed to send that information (a notation only, not the certificate) back to the parish of baptism, so if you contact the parishes of these other sacraments that may point you back to the parish of baptism. Please note that the parish of baptism cannot give you your certificate for First Communion, Confirmation, etc.; it would just have a notation that you received that sacrament (elsewhere). Sacramental certificates are only available from the parish where you celebrated that sacrament.

For birth or marriage records, you can also contact the County’s Hall of Records.

For Los Angeles, it is:

Los Angeles County Hall of Records
12400 E. Imperial Highway
Norwalk, CA 90242
(562) 462-2137  phone

2. Where were your sisters and brothers baptized? Sometimes siblings were baptized together, or at least at the same parish.

3. What address did you live at when you were baptized? We can check the map book and see in what parish that address geographically belongs.

4. Do you know the priest’s or deacon’s name who baptized you? If so, we can check the clergy records and see where he was stationed at the time.

5. Is there any remembrance of the parish (examples: it was named after Mary; it was in Hollywood; it was run by the Claretians)?

6. Was it in the City of Los Angeles or one of its suburbs? The City of Los Angeles has almost 100 parishes, while each suburb usually has only three or four.

7. Was it near downtown Los Angeles? Our Lady Queen of Angels Parish (also known as La Placita Olvera or the Plaza Church) is on Olvera Street, and baptizes many children each month. It is also the oldest parish in the City of Los Angeles. When people believe they were baptized in downtown Los Angeles, it is most likely this parish. Please contact:

Our Lady Queen of Angels Parish

Attention: Baptism Office
535 N. Main St.
Los Angeles, CA 90012-2870

phone: (213) 629-3101
e-mail: info@laplacita.org
parish website: www.laplacita.org

Many people were also baptized at the Cathedral of St. Vibiana in downtown Los Angeles. The Cathedral closed due to earthquake damage, and the records were moved to the new Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels. You may request baptismal records for St. Vibiana’s by sending a written request to:

Cathedral Archivist
Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels
555 W. Temple St.
Los Angeles, CA 90012
email: archives@olacathedral.org

Please note that it is the policy of the Cathedral Archives to make sacramental information available only to a person who is legally entitled to it. Therefore, Sacramental Registers of the Cathedral of St. Vibiana are closed to any type of genealogical research. By reason of a decree signed by Cardinal Mahony on 28 September 1999, Our Lady of the Angels Cathedral Parish is the successor entity to St. Vibiana Cathedral Parish. In other words, the Cathedral Parish was not suppressed but renamed, with its boundaries amended.

Accordingly, the sacramental records of St. Vibiana’s Parish now belong to Our Lady of the Angels Parish, regardless of where they are actually housed.  Accordingly, any certificate issued for a sacrament received in St. Vibiana’s Church should be issued under the seal of the Cathedral Parish.  It can be signed by anyone the Pastor designates, which could include the Cathedral Archivist.

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Records from Military Bases