Holy Family Church, Ramallah


The Holy Family Church It is a Catholic church of Latin or Roman rite located in Ramallah in the West Bank in the Palestinian Territories.
Latin Rite Catholics settled in Ramallah after the Sisters of St. Joseph and the Rosary Sisters opened a school for girls and a boarding school for boys in the decade of 1860-1870. Forty children become the Latin rite and soon a cure, Pierre Cotta, celebrate Mass in a house in the neighborhood of Hatha. He asks later the Latin Patriarch, Archbishop Valerga building a church, but permission by the civil authorities only reaches forty years later. There are 150 Catholics in 1870, and 242 in 1902. The construction of the present church began in 1913 with the permission of the Ottoman authorities who then ruled the place. A rectory, a convent for the nuns of the Holy Rosary and a school are also included.
By 1981 the number of Catholics of Latin rite had risen to 1,100 parishioners.