Kościół pw. Podwyższenia Krzyża Świętego, Grudziądz

Holy Cross Church in Grudziądz - on Bydgoska Street, founded in 1911. The present church was built in 1979-1985.

The first church in Grudziadz to bear the invocation of the Holy Cross was the Reformed Church, founded in 1751 and converted into a prison chapel in the 19th century. Due to the rapid development of the southern part of the city in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, efforts were made to build a Catholic church there. The parish priest of St. Nicholas Parish, Canon Otto Kunert, bought a vast plot of land on the corner of Chełmińska and Bydgoska Streets for this purpose and consecrated it on November 10, 1911. Despite the outbreak of World War I, construction began on 27 July 1915 and already on 1 October 1916 the consecration of the church dedicated to the Elevation of the Holy Cross took place. Funds were raised from collections, donations and the sale of the last two remaining quarters of the Gothic polyptych of Grudziadz to Malbork Castle. The designer of the church was Karl Krüger, and the construction was directed by Michal Olkowski. From the beginning, the idea was to build a larger church, intending to rebuild the newly erected building into a rectory and parish house with an auditorium. A little earlier on a neighboring plot of land an orphanage for boys was built by the Sisters of St. Elizabeth, and already after regaining independence, in 1921, the Sisters of the Resurrection settled nearby. An independent parish was established on July 1, 1934. The pastor was Rev. Canon Jan Klunder, who also conducted services for the military from the barracks in this part of the city. On the opposite side of Chelminska Street a Catholic House was built. During the German occupation, the pastor and two vicars, Father Konrad Kopański and Father Edmund Nagórski, were murdered by the Nazis. The makeshift church was demolished in 1983-1984. Before that, in 1975, Witold and Jacek Nagorski designed a new, larger church, which was erected in 1979-1985, and a freestanding 46-foot bell tower was added in 1987.

The old church standing along Chelminska Street was built in the style of modernistic classicism and was similar to the neighboring barracks and orphanage. Built on a rectangular plan, towerless, covered with a hipped roof, it bore little resemblance to a religious building from the outside. The one-storey plastered elevation with rectangular windows and pilaster sections was decorated with slightly marked risalits with triangular pediments. Small blocks of a sacristy and a chapel were added on the sides. The main entrance led from Bydgoska Street. The cosy interior, covered with a ceiling, was surrounded on three sides by galleries. There were 280 seats and 500 standing places. Apart from the main altar, there were two side altars and an altar in the chapel of St. Theresa.

The concrete, angular mass of the new church was placed perpendicularly to the old one. The jagged postmodernist facade is contrasted with a calm, bright interior with galleries. A crucifix and commemorative plaques in the porch and 2 confessionals remind us of the old church. In 2001 the largest in Grudziadz 40-voice organ was built, which allows organizing concerts in the church. The stained glass windows were designed by Krzysztof Cander.

The present church is the first religious building in Grudziadz, newly erected after World War II. Many parishioners - volunteers worked on its construction. The most deserving were immortalized in the foundation act of the church.

The initiator of the construction of the current building was the long-time parish priest, prelate Clement Baumgart, whose grave is located right next to it.