Church of Our Lady of Good Hope

Fort Good Hope, Canada

Open to visitors

The interior is normally open, possibly ticketed.

Strollie cannot guarantee access — always check before you travel.

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The Church of Our Lady of Good Hope is a small Carpenter Gothic Roman Catholic church built between 1865 and 1885 on a bluff overlooking the Mackenzie River in Fort Good Hope, Northwest Territories. Measuring only 45 by 25 feet, it was constructed as a mission of the Oblate Fathers and housed Father Émile Petitot, a renowned ethnologist, linguist, and geographer of the Canadian northwest, from 1864 to 1878. The building's austere exterior features wooden siding, a steeply pitched roof, lancet windows, and a lancet entranceway beneath a steepled bell tower—a plain interpretation of Carpenter Gothic style that contrasts strikingly with the extraordinary painted decoration adorning its interior. Designated a National Historic Site of Canada in 1977, the church stands as a modest yet significant testament to missionary presence in Canada's far north.