Holy Cross Immaculate Church in Mt. Adams held its annual "Stealing of the Statue" on Sunday afternoon, Feb. 19, for the locals and visitors.

The event, which has been going on for 50 years, serves as a fun and festive lead-up to the upcoming Saint Patrick's Day parade, which is less than a month away.

It was said to be a playful and humorous reenactment of a fictitious heist of a statue of St. Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland, who is also widely celebrated in Cincinnati.

The statue is prominently displayed in the church and is normally off-limits to the public, but during the event, it becomes the target of a mock theft.

Stealing of the Statue

During the annual mass, St. Patrick and local members of the Ancient Order of Hibernians (AOH) & Ladies Ancient Order of Hibernians (LAOH) who have passed away since the previous year’s service are honored.

Following the service, the St. Patrick statue is taken from the church, blessed, and paraded through the streets of Mt. Adams.

The statue will then be featured prominently in the St. Patrick's Parade, which takes place at noon on Saturday, Mar. 11, in downtown Cincinnati.

Tradition Roots

The origin of the Stealing of the Statue is rooted in the historical tension between German and Irish Catholic congregants in Cincinnati. Mt. Adams.

This is where both Irish and German working-class families lived, and they had two Catholic churches - Church of the Holy Cross for the Irish and Immaculata Church for the Germans.

The Holy Cross parish was established in 1873 to serve Irish immigrants.

Meanwhile, Immaculata was dedicated in 1860 to serving the German congregation as part of Archbishop John Baptist Purcell's management of ethnic differences in the archdiocese in 19th-century Cincinnati.

For a hundred years, both churches coexisted peacefully.

However, with changes in the neighborhood and religious demographics, the Holy Cross congregation was informed in 1970 that their church would close.

Moreover, they would merge with the German parish of Immaculata Church.

In an attempt to make the Irish parishioners feel more at home, Jim Crowley of Crowley's Pub in Mt. Adams asked if the St. Patrick statue could be moved to Immaculata.

The statue, originally donated to the church by James Healy in the 1920s, was unofficially moved to Immaculata Church on March 15, 1970.

It is done by a group of Irishmen who took advantage of an unlocked church door.

Every March, the AOH takes part in a lively procession with bagpipe music and "steals" the St. Patrick statue.

However, those involved in the parade no longer use the original statue.

Instead, the Hibernians use a statue that was previously located in St. Patrick's Church.

In 2012, artists Mike Hendley and Linda Mitchell refurbished this St. Patrick statue.

There is a story involving the Crowley's patrons that one year when the Irish "rascals" took the statue, a miniature was substituted in its place.

Consequently, the original statue was safely kept in a back room of the pub for the Hibernians. 

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