The History of the Congregation of Holy Cross

In 1837, Basile Moreau, C.S.C., founded the Congregation of Holy Cross (C.S.C.), a community of Catholic priests and brothers, to minister to and educate the people of France devastated by the French Revolution. During the centuries that followed, the Congregation expanded its mission around the globe to educate and evangelize, including the establishment in 1842 of the Congregation's first educational institution in America--the University of Notre Dame. This sweeping book, written by the skilled historian and archivist James T. Connelly, C.S.C., offers the first complete history of the Congregation, covering nearly two centuries from 1820 to 2018.

Throughout this volume, Connelly focuses on the ministry of the Congregation rather than on its ministers, although some important individuals are discussed, including Jacques-François Dujarié; Sr. Mary of the Seven Dolors, M.S.C.; André Bessette, C.S.C.; and Edward Sorin, C.S.C. Within a few short years of founding the Congregation, Moreau sent the priests, brothers, and sisters from France to Algeria, the United States, Canada, Italy, and East Bengal. Connelly chronicles in great detail the suppression of all religious orders in France in 1903 and demonstrates how the Congregation shifted its subsequent expansion efforts to North America. Numerous educational institutions, parishes, and other ministries were founded in the United States and Canada during these decades. In 1943, Holy Cross again extended its work to South America. With the most recent establishment of a religious presence in the Philippines in 2008, Holy Cross today serves in sixteen different countries on five continents. The book describes the beatification of Basil Moreau, C.S.C, on September 15, 2007, and the canonization of André Bessette, C.S.C. on October 17, 2010. The book will interest C.S.C. members and historians of Catholic history. Anyone who wants to learn about the origins of the University of Notre Dame will want to read this definitive history of the Congregation.

James T. Connelly, C.S.C., was associate professor of history at the University of Portland and resident director of the University's study abroad program in Salzburg, Austria. He has worked as an archivist for the Congregation of the Holy Cross and has published many articles and reviews on American religious history and the history of the Congregation of Holy Cross.

Connelly, the congregation's archivist, is understandably able to go much deeper into the spirit of hope that not only brought the order into existence in post-Revolutionary France but defines its ministries to this day. . . . [He] details how the congregation cultivated charisms or spiritual gifts for parish ministry, education and missions. --The Journal Gazette

I want to celebrate and applaud the publication of Father Jim Connelly's The History of the Congregation of Holy Cross. Father Connelly's book is the first to retell this great story. For this, we can all be forever grateful. --Edward A. Malloy, C.S.C., president emeritus, University of Notre Dame

"This is an important contribution to the history of the order from its early days in Le Mans, France, to its international institutional footprint at the end of the twentieth century. James Connelly has produced an important, incredibly well-researched volume." --William B. Kurtz, co-editor of Soldiers of the Cross, the Authoritative Text

As the longtime archivist for the then Indiana Province of Holy Cross, and a well-published American Church historian, Father Jim Connelly is eminently qualified to write this long-overdue book. --Fr. Richard Gribble, CSC, author of Father of the Fatherless

Without doubt, Fr. Jim Connelly is the foremost expert on the worldwide history of the Congregation of Holy Cross. This book is most welcome, especially with its critical and scholarly, yet highly readable, approach. --Rev. Arthur Wheeler, C.S.C., University of Portland