Holy Ghost Byzantine Church

About

Holy Ghost Church was founded by 112 Carpetho-Rusin immigrants who had come to America lured by the promise of work in the mines of Northeast Pennsylvania. Carpetho-Rusins come from a mountainous region known as Carpetho-Ruthenia nestled between present-day Slovakia and Ukraine. United by a desire for a local Byzantine Catholic Church, they purchased three plots of land on First Avenue in Jessup and constructed a wood-framed church. The church was dedicated in 1899 under the patronage of the Holy Ghost. That same year, the church purchased land along Moosic Lake Road to establish a parish cemetery. A rectory was built next to the church in 1904, under the direction of our first resident pastor, the Reverend Emil Artimovich. One of the first Byzantine Catholic schools in the Diocese was erected under the third pastor of the parish, the Reverend Theodore Ladomersky. On June 28, 1910, the parish renamed itself "The United Greek Catholic Church of the Holy Ghost of Jessup, PA" to affirm its loyalty to the Holy See of Rome. Through the years, the parish saw great growth and expanded the church to house its congregation. They also enlarged the school and the cemetery.