The Xining South Cathedral is a Catholic church established by Franciscan missionaries in the late 19th century, a reminder that the Catholic mission in western China was extensive and often courageous — missionaries working in this region in the 1890s and early 1900s were operating in genuinely remote frontier conditions, often learning Tibetan in order to reach the plateau communities. The church serves a small but continuous Catholic congregation and reflects the multicultural religious history of a city that contains mosques, Buddhist temples, Daoist sanctuaries, and a Christian church within walking distance of each other.
The building is modest — a whitewashed structure with a simple campanile — but its presence in the city is historically interesting. It is open for Sunday services and sometimes during the week; services are in Chinese. Non-worshipping visitors are welcome to look around the interior, which has a few pieces of devotional art from the mission period.