The city of Liverpool prides itself on religious confusion. Even diehard fans of its rival football teams sometimes struggle to remember which one is Protestant (answer below). But the status of Liverpool's two greatest churches is more clear-cut.
As all visitors learn sooner or later, the Anglican cathedral was built by a Catholic, and the Catholic cathedral was built by an Anglican.
It would be truer to say that the Catholic cathedral was built by two Anglicans. Of the vast structure originally planned by Sir Edwin Lutyens, only the crypt ever made it off the drawing board, before the second World War, Lutyens' death, and Vatican II all intervened. Fans of church architecture are still divided on which of these last three events was the greatest disaster.
At any rate, the over-ground part of the cathedral was completed in modernist-style by Frederick Gibberd - who also designed Heathrow Airport - in the mid 1960s. Its central tower was supposed to evoke Christ's crown of thorns. But the comparisons with a tent could not be ignored either. With a nod to the ethnic origins of most of the city's Catholics, Liverpudlians duly christened the cathedral "Paddy's Wigwam".
The Lutyens design, meanwhile, is regarded as one of the greatest churches never built. Its dome would have dwarfed even St Peter's in Rome. And yet the epic scale was at least partly motivated by local rivalry. When the foundation stone was laid in 1933, the plan was to outdo the gargantuan structure then rising at the other end of Hope Street.
Among the many astonishing things about the Anglican Cathedral is that it was built entirely in the 20th century. Another is that the architect - Giles Gilbert Scott - was a 22-year-old novice when he submitted the winning design in 1903.
It is perhaps less of a surprise that Scott was Catholic. With a tower rising to 330 feet and containing the world's tallest bells, the cathedral is high-church Anglicanism in every sense. Except for the new café bar tucked away off a side aisle, everything about it is designed to strike awe into the observer. The building's epic scale is underlined by the fact that although he lived well into his 60s, Scott did not survive long enough to see it finished, in 1978.
Ironically, the Anglican Cathedral opened just as Liverpool had lost most of the wealth and self-confidence that spawned the rash of church-building. Religious belief was on the wane too. In 1966, a year before the Catholic cathedral opened, one of the city's pop-stars was able to claim that the Beatles were "more popular than Jesus". But whatever about that, by the 1980s, Liverpool was an economic basket case.
It was probably already a cliché then that soccer had become the new religion. Even so, it may not have been a coincidence that the period of Merseyside's worst decline coincided with an era of unrivalled football supremacy, as Liverpudlians turned from Hope Street to Anfield Road in search of consolation.
Not that everyone turned. As recently as last week, the faith was alive - in every sense - for a fan from the city's blue half, who signed the visitor book in the Catholic cathedral with the message: "Thank the Lord for getting Everton into Europe".
There was no mention of Everton's rivals, who also seem to have God on their side lately. But insofar as the two clubs have religious affiliations, this message was in keeping with it. Contrary to what many people think, Everton is Merseyside's Catholic team.
In fact, both clubs were founded by Protestants. There is Methodism in the madness of the Liverpool-Everton rivalry, planted by the socially reforming founders who established both clubs in the late 1800s. It was only half a century later that their identities diverged beyond the matter of shirt colour.
Today, older fans recall a time when nuns collected for charity outside Goodison Park, while the Salvation Army looked after Anfield. But having briefly flourished, the sectarian identities have long since withered. The Liverpool-Everton rivalry has become unusual among the genre for having no geographic, political, social, or religious raison d'être.
Despite this, when both clubs realised they had outlived their current addresses, the possibility of them sharing a new stadium was as problematic as Catholics and Anglicans building a joint cathedral. There were protracted talks, but they broke down. Separate developments of varying grandiosity are now proceeding.
The city is a building site generally at the moment, as long-term regeneration meets deadlines for Liverpool's designation as 2008 European City of Culture. And the status of the football clubs notwithstanding, the nearest thing to a cathedral now rising on the skyline is probably the £1 billion retail development, Liverpool One, under construction near the waterfront.
Liverpool's modern-day spiritual quest was epitomized by the members of its most famous band, who traveled as far away as India in search of wisdom. The Catholic-born George Harrison thought he found it there, and his ashes are rumoured to have been scattered on the River Ganges. The final resting place of the other Beatle to have passed on is unknown, except to Yoko Ono, although he too seemed to have found peace before he died.
Among John Lennon's permanent memorials now is the city's airport. Not only is it named after him, it also takes a line from one of his songs as its motto. Christians and nervous flyers may not be reassured by the thought. But everywhere you look in the airport these days, from the duty free shop to the roof of the terminal building, you see the message: "Above us only sky."