MOCRA highlights the ongoing dialogue between contemporary artists and the world's faith traditions, as well as the ways visual art can encourage and facilitate interfaith understanding.

[1][2][3][4] MOCRA had its genesis in the doctoral dissertation of Jesuit priest Terrence E. Dempsey, S.J., who studied at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California, with such noted art historians and theologians as Peter Selz, Jane Daggett Dillenberger, John Dillenberger, and Doug Adams, all pioneers in the study of art and religion.

An opportunity arose in 1990, when the Jesuits decided to relocate their house of studies from Fusz Memorial Hall to smaller residences near the Saint Louis University campus.

[5] Renovation of the space began in the spring of 1992, with completion targeted for early September 1992, in time to host a pre-opening conference of the Society for the Arts, Religion and Contemporary Culture (ARC).

[6] MOCRA opened to the public on February 14, 1993, with the inaugural exhibition Sanctuaries: Recovering the Holy in Contemporary Art, which featured more than 100 works from a wide-ranging roster of 25 artists.