Father Francis Brunner and the Land of the Cross-Tipped Churches

In the middle of the 1800s, immigrants from Germany who first settled on our East Coast began to move westward. Some began their trip across the Appalachian Mountains to the Ohio River, then southwest on the Ohio to Cincinnati. Others followed the Great Lakes to northern Ohio then on to west central Ohio. It is here that two communities developed, one named Minster where the German Catholics settled and one called New Bremen for the German Protestants.

Archbishop John B. Purcell of the Diocese of Cincinnati, which covered the whole state, petitioned Rome for missionary priests. Fr. Francis de Sales Brunner, a member of the Congregation of the Most Precious Blood, answered the call. He and eight other priests set sail for America and after weeks of steamship-travel discomfort, landed in New Orleans on December 21, 1843. Eleven days of river travel brought them to Cincinnati where they finally met Bishop Purcell on New Year's Day. The good bishop gave them some rest, food and horses and had to send them on their way, in the harsh Ohio winter, north to New Riegel, near Tiffin, and to St. Alphonsus Station, near Norwalk, Ohio. The Bishop told Fr. Brunner that his missionary circuit included all the Germans within a 100 mile radius! Without hesitation, Fr. Brunner went to work. If he knew what was in store for him, would he have done it? One can easily answer yes because he did it for the rest of his life, never ceasing, filled with zeal and love for Christ.

It took months for circuit riding priests to visit all their parishioners, celebrate Mass, hear confessions, baptize, marry and bury. Then start all over again. The hardships of that life killed them two-thirds died before spending 12 years as a circuit rider, half died before the age of 30. There was endless travel. They would rise before dawn so they could make good use of the morning light. They would have to hunt and fish, cook and clean, mend their clothes, bandage their wounds and their horse's wounds, doctor themselves when they were sick. They had to swim through creeks and swamps and ride in the rain and snow. Sometimes they spent the whole day wet from head to toe. Their horses' legs got skinned because of the bramble and thorns. Arthritis was a constant, unwelcome companion to both priest and horse. One circuit rider wrote, "What I have suffered in mind and body my pen is not able to communicate."

The circuit riding priests were in a certain sense the first to tame the wilderness. The early German immigrants were rugged souls who built cabins and cleared paths through the forests but the hamlets didn't lose their wilderness until the settlers had their priest. Even the hardiest pioneers could become discouraged in desolate and difficult circumstances. The men farmed, tended the horses, were the blacksmiths, storekeepers, doctors and lawyers. Most held two jobs to earn enough for their families. The women stayed close to the hearth, cooking, cleaning, laundering, making clothes and bedding, candles and soap, gardening and taking care of the children. The children worked side by side with their parents as the work load was overwhelming and never ending. They all lived with diseases tuberculosis, cholera, scarlet fever, diphtheria and measles and many died untimely deaths. But with the arrival of the priest came a sense of security that bred confidence in the most forlorn surroundings.

One of the first things Fr. Brunner did was secure a tract of land ½ mile north of St. John, the log church built by the settlers of Minster. In six months he built a convent and brought Precious Blood Sisters to Ohio, entrusting them with the education of the children. Father named the convent Maria Stein after a Benedictine Monastery in Switzerland.

Father Brunner's goal was to have a church, school and convent in every tiny hamlet in his region. His philosophy was simple: the more people praying, the better the world will be. Father's goal matched that of the settlers. A church in each hamlet echoed the landscape of their native Germany. Devout Catholics, they desired participation at daily Mass but without their own church nearby, it was impossible. The journey to Minster every Sunday was a difficult one. Nineteenth century roads were nearly impossible to cross when it rained or snowed. A daily trip was out of the question.

Father Brunner lived long enough to see his dream started. He spent 15 years as Father to the Germans who settled Ohio. He died in 1859. His legacy was only beginning. Churches continued to be built and his predecessors carried on his plans. In 1875 Father John Garner from Milwaukee entrusted his large collection of relics to the Sisters of the Precious Blood at Maria Stein. A new chapel was built before the turn of the century and pilgrims started coming to Ohio from all over the world.

Presently, one can find no less than 34 sites attributed to the work of Father Brunner, 30 of them active Catholic parishes. They are all within a 22-mile radius of the convent Father opened in 1844. Now called the Shrine of the Holy Relics at Maria Stein, it and many of Father Brunner's churches are on the National Register of Historic Places. The National Park Service has designated the region the Land of the Cross-Tipped Churches and the State of Ohio has named the route that runs through the heart of it a State Scenic Byway.

Good Friday Tradition at Holy Cross-Immaculata Makes Climbers

Feel Good Inside

BY Richelle Thompson

The Cincinnati Enquirer (publication date unknown)

Randy Lipps can't remember the first time he spent Good Friday praying the steps at Holy Cross-Immaculata Church in Mount Adams. He's followed the tradition as long as his memory stretches. But April 1, 1983, stands out with crystal clarity.

Under cloudy skies, an 11-year-old Randy and his 9-year-old cousin, Marsha Heidi, climbed the 85 steps that stretch from St. Gregory Street to the church on the hill. Like thousands of Catholics and some Protestants since the Good Friday pilgrimages began 141 years ago, Randy and Marsha recited prayers at each step.

"Back then (praying the steps) was something we did because my mom asked us," says Mr. Lipps, 28, of Northside. Still, even then, he felt good when he finished. There was a sense of being part of something bigger than himself that even a child could comprehend.

The faded newspaper clip is tucked in a scrapbook, but Mr. Lipps will come to Holy Cross-Immaculata today. Although he follows in the footsteps of his grandmother and mother, of his four brothers and cousins, Mr. Lipps charts his own path. He prays the steps by choice.

"Christ sacrificed Himself for us," he says. "It's just something we can do to say thanks and to reflect upon it."

Over the 24 hours of Good Friday, about 12,000 likely will make the pilgrimage. The Rev. Stan Neiheisel begins the tradition in the quiet blackness of midnight by blessing the concrete steps amid a small crowd of devotees.

Many wait until dawn to begin their ascent, stopping at the top of Mount Adams to pray at the foot of a statue of Jesus crucified on the Cross. They can look out and see commuters dodging traffic and barges inching down the river.

They will share donuts and coffee as the dew rises and eat fish-fry dinners as the sun sets. They will sit in wooden pews to worship during the Good Friday services.

With this tradition, people "really take time out and think about things that are important," says Father Neiheisel.

"In the rain or anything else, still lots and lots of people will walk it. They'll walk with their umbrellas and their raincoats and anything else, but they'll be there."

Bill Elfers, 80, estimates he's climbed the steps more than 70 times.

Bill Elfers missed praying the steps when he joined the Civilian Conservation Corps during the Depression and when he served in the Navy during World War II.

Bad knees knocked him out of praying the steps a few other times.

But for most of his 80 years, Mr. Elfers has spent Good Friday on the steep concrete steps.

Mr. Elfers likes to say he was born on the second floor of the Pavilion parking lot, in a Mount Adams house long since torn down to make room for cars. One of seven children of John and Mary Elfers, he's lived in the neighborhood of shotgun houses and specialty shops his whole life.

Good Friday was near when Mr. Elfers could smell pea soup cooking on his mom's stove.

Praying the steps took 10 minutes on young knees. Today, Mr. Elfers expects it'll take 20 to 30 minutes.

"Especially when you start getting older, you think about new life and what's going to happen to you," Mr. Elfers says.

He'll pray for "good health and that everything goes well and that the good Lord will be with me when my time comes to go."

Kath Scully Hueneman will greet pilgrims at the top. She hopes to pray the steps but fears bad health may impede her.

The 73-year-old Mount Adams resident hasn't missed too many years though. It's a tradition she prizes.

Mrs. Hueneman lives in the same house she was born and can remember passing by the pretzel vendor on her way up the steps as a child.

The pretzel man carried a big, woven, laundry basket covered with an oilcloth. Inside were mounds of fresh, chewy, homemade pretzels.

"Once you were 14, you couldn't buy them anymore. You had to fast," she says. "When you were 14, you had to walk right past, and think, "Boy, I wish I could have some of that.'"

It was a simple, temporal reminder of the Divine Sacrifice.

When Mrs. Hueneman prays the steps, she thinks about Christ's passion and His walk to Calvary.

For a moment, "you feel like you're with Him on His way to the Cross," she says. And "you feel like He's with you."