Holy Cross Church, Parish church in Offenburg, Germany

Holy Cross Church is a baroque house of worship distinguished by a three-storey tower that dominates Offenburg's skyline. Inside, a series of columns and pillars divide the interior into three aisles, creating distinct zones throughout the main prayer space.

The original structure dates to the 13th century, but a major fire in 1689 destroyed much of the medieval building. Reconstruction employed principles from the Vorarlberg Architectural School, resulting in the baroque structure visible today.

The Ölberg on the church square is a Gothic niche chapel built around 1524, showing Peter, John and James with the praying Christ, while henchmen enter through a door behind. The main figures are 1955 copies; the originals are kept in the Lapidarium of the Vinzentiushaus. A crucifix by Peter Valentin the Elder on the square marks the site of the old cemetery.

The tower rises 68.44 metres, making the church the tallest building in Offenburg, so it works as a fixed orientation point in the town centre. The main entrance leads into the nave, with the Gothic choir and its surviving medieval masonry at the far end; the Ölberg chapel stands outside on the church square. The organ, renewed in 2001 by Claudius Winterhalter, has 36 registers.

Remnants of the original medieval walls remain visible in the gothic choir sections, having survived the 1689 fire. These fragments reveal that reconstruction did not erase the entire past and provide a direct view of how building layers accumulated across different periods.