Nombre de Dios (mission)

Nombre de Dios is a Spanish Catholic mission in St. Augustine, Florida, United States, on the west side of Matanzas Bay. It is part of the Roman Catholic Diocese of St. Augustine.

The mission traces its origins to September 8, 1565, when Admiral Pedro Menéndez de Avilés landed with a band of settlers to found St. Augustine. Father Francisco Lopez de Mendoza Grajales, who was the chaplain of the expedition, celebrated the first Thanksgiving Mass on the grounds. A formal Franciscan mission was founded near the city in 1587, perhaps the first mission in the continental United States. The mission served nearby villages of the Mocama, a Timucua group, and was at the center of an important chiefdom in the late 16th and 17th century.

First the Jesuits and later the Franciscans ministered to the resident Spanish colonists, and made some efforts to evangelize the local Mocama and Agua Dulce peoples near St. Augustine. They were particularly successful in the Mocama village known as Nombre de Dios, converting the chief and her daughter. In 1587, at the beginning of the Franciscans' first major missionization push, a mission was founded at Nombre de Dios, served by a resident friar.

The Great Cross was dedicated by Archbishop Casimiro Morcillo of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Madrid during the diocesan Eucharistic Congress of October 1966 at the direction of Archbishop Joseph P. Hurley to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the founding of the Mission Nombre de Dios. It is made of stainless steel and towers 208 feet above the Matanzas marshes.

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