on the
Via Dolorosa on the church exterior During the early 1800s, the first Catholics in Columbus were visited only occasionally by traveling priests of the
Dominican Order. When Father Thomas Martin,
OP visited Columbus on May 15, 1833, a group of five local landowners (Samuel and Margaret Crosby, Nathaniel and Caroline Medbury, and Phoebe Otis) met with him and proposed to gift property at Fifth and Walnut streets to the
Catholic Church provided that a church building be constructed and in use within five years’ time. That building,
Saint Remigius Church, was dedicated on April 29, 1838. Measuring at just 55 feet long and 30 feet wide, Saint Remigius Church was planned as a temporary place of worship that would later be turned into a school. The pastors at Saint Remigius also served the Catholics in neighboring cities in addition to the parish's own primarily German congregation. Father William Schonat became the first resident priest in 1843, the same year the first rectory at the site was finished. By then, the growing Catholic population in Columbus necessitated a larger church building. At
Father Juncker's request, the parish was renamed “Holy Cross”. The present structure was completed and consecrated by bishop
John Purcell on January 16, 1848, A fire in June 1877 burned most of the high altar and caused $20,000 of damage. Following repairs, bishop
Augustus Toebbe of the
Diocese of Covington rededicated the church in 1880.
Holy Cross School A frame school for the parish - the first parochial school in Columbus - was built in 1843, and initially staffed by lay teachers. In 1856, Fr.
Casper Borgess, the pastor of the church, brought
Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur from Cincinnati to teach, the first religious women to teach in the city. Beginning in 1872, the boys of the parish were taught by
Marianist brothers from Dayton. Beginning in 1993, the growing Spanish-speaking Catholic population in Central Ohio was served at Holy Cross by the non-geographic
personal parish of Santa Cruz, established by bishop
James Griffin. Holy Cross was selected because of its central location for Latinos living in
Franklin County. In 2001, due to the congregation's continued growth, its worship site moved to
Holy Name Church in the
Old North Columbus area.
Suppression and merger with St. Joseph Cathedral Citing "demographic changes... a decline in the number of registered parishioners, a decline in Mass attendance, decline in offertory revenue, and the shortage of priests...", bishop
Earl Fernandes suppressed the parish and merged its territory with that of
St. Joseph Cathedral on April 5, 2023. Holy Cross will continue to serve as a site of worship. ==Exterior==