date: 10.03.2014.
On Sunday, March 16, we will celebrate the 80th anniversary of the construction of the cross on Cross Mountain and we will remember celebration of the first Holy Mass that was celebrated on that day at the foot of that cross. The Anniversary will be celebrated as follows: on Friday, March 14, there will be prayer of the Way of the Cross at 2 p.m., while on Sunday, March 16, all those who have built the cross will be specially remembered in the Holy Mass at 11 a.m in the church of St. James. After the evening Holy Mass at 7 p.m. there will be the Solemn Academy, when documentary movie about Cross Mountain will be shown.
For generations, the parishioners of Medjugorje parish have always been connected to Christ and His cross. Finally, their love was summoned in the 14 meters tall cross on the top of Cross Mountain, previously hill Sipovac that surrounds Medjugorje on the south part of its parish. They have erected this cross with the intention that every person who enters this parish would see that sign and recognises it as the main mark of all those who lived there. They also decided to express their belonging to Christ and to the Church and this was their desire for the 1900th anniversary of His passion and death.
Back in those days, all of them, children and elderly, took needed material in their hands all the way to the top of the rugged hill. Finally, on March 16, 1934, the cross was solemnly blessed and the Holy Mass was celebrated. The relic of the true cross on which Jesus was crucified was sent to them from Rome for that occasion and was carved inside the cross. The hill Sipovac was solemnly renamed to Krizevac - Cross Mountain. From the day when the parish priest at that time, Fr. Bernardin Smoljan, presented this idea to his parishioners, until the day when this cross was blessed, only 52 days had passed. The construction plan was made by engineer Simun Boras from Mostar, and all construction works were conducted by Ante Dugandzic Redzo from Medjugorje. Already on April 12, 1935 the penance procession went up to the top of Cross Mountain and Holy Mass followed it. In September in the same year, the feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross was celebrated according to the instructions of local bishop at that time, Fr. Alojzije Misic. Cross Mountain has in the last three decades become the inevitable pilgrimage destination for all those who have been coming to Medjugorje, and parishioners and pilgrims regularly pray the Way of the Cross every Friday at this special place.
