Mission
Following the charism and vision of our founder, Blessed Basile Moreau, the Congregation of Holy Cross continues the mission of Jesus Christ entrusted to the Catholic Church by working to “make God known, loved, and served, and thus save souls.” As apostolic religious brothers and religious priests at the service of the Universal Church, we go wherever the Spirit and this mission lead us. Today this includes 16 countries around the world.
Even in the increasingly complex world in which he lived, Moreau knew that education held the key to evangelization. That was true whether leading people back into the faith in post-Revolutionary France or leading new people into the faith in the foreign missions.
This is why Moreau charged the religious of Holy Cross to be educators in the faith, wherever we were sent and in whatever ministry we served. We were to evangelize through education.
Explore the Congregation's charism as Educators in the Faith
We shall always place education side by side with instruction; the mind will not be cultivated at the expense of the heart. While we prepare useful citizens for society, we shall likewise do our utmost to prepare citizens for heaven. – Blessed Basile Moreau
From the very beginning, Holy Cross priests and brothers carried out this work of educating and evangelizing in schools and parishes. Within four years of the founding, this work expanded beyond the borders of France to include an increasing array of foreign missions.
To the present day, both educational institutions, from grade schools and high schools to colleges and universities, and parochial ministry continue to be the pillars of the Congregation’s work of educating and evangelizing. As we have throughout our history, the Congregation also engages in other apostolic works of outreach and social justice to share the Good News with those in need.
Wherever through its superiors the congregation sends us we go as educators in the faith to those whose lot we share, supporting men and women of grace and goodwill everywhere in their efforts to form communities of the coming kingdom. – Constitutions, 2:12
The Congregation continues to see the mission entrusted to it as sending us “across borders of every sort” (Constitutions, 2:17). Sometimes those are international borders between countries; other times they are socio-economic, cultural, linguistic, and other barriers that keep people from hearing and accepting the Good News of Jesus Christ.
Even with this international mission, Holy Cross always realizes and carries out its work in particular local communities in response to their needs, especially the needs of the poor. Wherever we minister, we serve in the midst of the people of God.
“We come not just as servants but as their neighbors, to be with them and of them” (Constitutions, 2:14). Whether it is living in dorms with students, welcoming parishioners into our lives, or living in the poor neighborhoods of our missions, we share our lives and community with those we serve.
Learn about our community as religious brothers and religious priests