Canons Regular of the Order of the Holy Cross
| Canonici Regulares Ordinis S. Crucis | |
| Abbreviation | O.S.C. |
|---|---|
| Type | Clerical Religious Congregation (Institute of Consecrated Life) |
| Headquarters | Via del Velabro 19, 00186 Roma, Italy |
|
Membership (2014)
|
383 (241 priests) |
|
Superior General
|
Msgr. Laurentius Tarpin |
| Website | www |
The Canons Regular of the Order of the Holy Cross, commonly called Crosiers, are a Roman Catholic religious order.
The Crosiers were founded by five men attached to the household of the prince-bishop of Liege, Rudolf of Zähringen, who accompanied the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa on the Third Crusade (1189–1191). Upon their return, the five, led by Theodorus de Cellis (1166–1236), sought a new way of life, and shortly before his death, their bishop appointed them to be canons of his St. Lambert's Cathedral, Liège.
After efforts to renew the life and practice of the college of canons to which they belonged, the five withdrew from Liège and moved up the Meuse River to a place called Clairlieu, outside the city of Huy, and began a way of life more in keeping with their ideals. This settlement of the five at Huy was the beginning of their Order, and the house and small church dedicated to Saint Theobald that they established there became the Order's motherhouse. Pope Innocent III verbally approved their Order on the feast day of the Finding of the Holy Cross, 3 May 1210, and Pope Innocent IV granted them full and final approval on 3 May 1248 the Feast of the Finding of the Holy Cross.
In 1410, the Crosiers' general chapter ordered the destruction of its records and decisions from the time of its foundation. The reason for this radical act is recorded to have been a thorough reformation of some sort, but it left the Order's modern historians with only fragments and clues to their Order's first two centuries, and the tradition summarized above.
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