St. Francis Borgia Catholic Church

Another note until we learn about this church. Due to the heavily influence of German and Irish Protestants in Cedarburg, they were not just the sole religious group here. German and Irish Catholics also made a majority of the area both during the founding of Cedarburg, as well as the community's development into a more diverse religious community as a whole.

Moving to another church in the community is vastly different from the Lutheran influence here in the town with other churches established here, Saint Francis Borgia Catholic Church. Once you turn around and face North, you can see the entirety of downtown Cedarburg with the many buildings that we have seen and learned about and the vast beauty surrounding it. But on the other hand, this church goes back to the founding of Cedarburg itself around 1842. In 1842, there was Jesuit Preist named Father Martin Kunding, who was before an assigned pastor in Milwaukee. But he did not just minister in Milwaukee only; he would travel to mostly Irish Catholic habitants in Milwaukee's areas on horseback. He would also sometimes conduct worship services in their homes and help establish parishes in those areas.

One of the parishes established in Cedarburg would be founded in 1844. But it wouldn't be a cathedral; first, it was mainly a log cabin. Due to the area still consisting of forests and the main road not being introduced yet to the town. Once Cedarburg was founded in the late 1840s, the log cabin would be replaced in 1852 by a much larger framed church. But the settlers here who were Catholics were even earlier than before the founding of Cedarburg. In the 1830s, settlers from Ireland made a small village that would become part of Cedarburg called Newland. Even before the Potato Famine in the 1840s, Irish immigrants were already settling in the United States due to the hardships there and no recognition of the independence of Ireland from England. In this time frame, along with Father Martin Kunding, the state that would be Wisconsin was named the Wisconsin territory. 

Once the frame church was built in 1852, St. Francis Borgia would welcome its first pastor, the parish named Father Jacobus Colton as its pastor. But around the middle of the 1860s, the parish itself started to grow so fast that the framed church would have to be larger than the first one. So the church's next pastor, Father Joseph Hermon, chose land triangular in shape. Unfortunately, this triangular land would intersect at the corners near what was then the village of Hamilton and a road called the Plank Road that would become Cedarburg. So, as a result, the congregants of Newland would have to move the original location of the church south down what is today Washington Avenue. There were concerns about whether this new location was beneficial to the parish, but Father Joseph Hermon thought that the move would be. The church still stands on the triangular field that Hermon chose.

During the years when the parish moved their church to a new location, they also helped establish other parishes in the area. These parishes would not exist anymore, but at one time, they were a part of St. Francis Borgia and its significant connections to the Archdiocese of Milwaukee. This is where German Lutherans, the main religious component of the community, came to step in and help the parish establish its new church. Now let's think here for a minute or two; the Protestant Reformation created a deep schism in the Catholic Church in 1517 when Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to a church in Wittenburg, Germany. Indeed, there had to be tensions between Protestants, Lutherans, and Catholics during this period. This was also due to Americans' hostile attitude toward Irish, German, or other European Catholics. This hostility also came from Irish and German Protestants, even though native-born Americans did not consider them assimilated and cultured Americans. In 1844, for example, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, there was a nativist riot where native-born Americans, as well as some Irish and German Protestants, believed that Irish and German Catholics were going to take their jobs away, as well as a massive hostility to Catholic schools and churches not reading The Bible (specifically the King James Version) in their schools, as well as a fear where they believed that Catholics were going to make the United States a Catholic nation instead of a Protestant nation. 

As a result, riots brook out in Lombard Street in Philadelphia and Southwark, a neighborhood in Philadelphia, where mobs burned down Catholic Churches and schools and killed dozens of individuals. The militia would come in to restore order, only to get into a shooting match with the mob and a firefight broke out between them. Eventually, the militia would restore order. This context helps set up the situation in Cedarburg between Irish Catholics and German Lutherans. But Cedarburg's leaders, German Lutherans, thought that the church's building was beneficial to the community. They did this because they wanted to make Cedarburg the most influential community in the area and Ozaukee County. So German, Irish, and other European Protestants donated money, funds, and other capital to help buy the triangular parcel of land that the parish was moving the church to; they would help the parish purchase the land in 1868. After this, the church would start being built with Bedford limestone, along with additions of its Romanesque door and windows. There were other additions to the church; buttresses, pinnacles, and the church's spire were inspired by a Gothic design. The church was finished and dedicated in 1870, at the cost of just $30,000, thanks to the donations of the German and Irish Protestants in Cedarburg. 

Today, St. Francis Borgia still stands on the triangular field purchased by the parish and the Cedarburg community. Today there are two churches in the area; one is to the North of Cedarburg, where they have a school, and the original one, which is on the Triangular field, is now called the South Church. But the South Church is the original one that was established in 1870. As you turn around and face North, you can see the entirety of downtown Cedarburg and its natural beauty. This also could have been why this church has a commanding spot here in town.

History, Saint Francis Borgia Catholic Parish. Accessed May 21st 2022. https://www.saintfrancisborgia.org/about-us/history/.

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