It is the spiritual home to more than 1,600 communicants, including numerous students studying at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

The small log building, known as New Hope Chapel, stood where the Carolina Inn is now but disappeared during the American Revolution.

The settlement on New Hope Chapel Hill remained, the University of North Carolina was founded in 1795, and traveling clergy visited, but a permanent Episcopal congregation did not form again for half a century.

The growing congregation worshiped in one another's homes for five years as work on their little church went slowly, using handmade bricks fired in kilns on the Rev.

Alfred Lawrence (rector 1921–1944) asked the distinguished church architect Hobart B. Upjohn to design a new building to be connected to “the old chapel” by a cloister.

David Yates (rector 1945–1959) insisted that a Christian community was obligated to pray for the enemy and respect the rights of conscientious objectors, however difficult, during World War II.

She presided in the same chapel where her grandmother, Cornelia, a slave child belonging to Mary Ruffin Smith, was baptized in 1854.

Peter James Lee (rector 1971–1984) introduced the use of the 1979 Book of Common Prayer and opened the pulpit and altar to women priests.

His tenure has been marked by an intentional focus on expanding the outreach ministry of the parish and its role in the community as exemplified in the development of a Sister Parish Covenant with St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal Church, a student-parish Habitat for Humanity partnership, continued strong campus ministry, and increased outreach funding.

A new parish house, designed by Washington architects Hartman-Cox, was opened in October 2014 providing the Great Hall, classrooms, preschool, and youth and music facilities.

Elizabeth Marie Melchionna became Rector on August 1, 2016 The history of the Chapel of the Cross has been marked by steady growth.

Sunday School is held every week with a variety of other programs and discussion groups on topics ranging from the death penalty to the environment.

The main governing body of the Chapel of the Cross is the vestry, which is composed of twelve lay people elected from the congregation for three-year terms.

Robert Duncan (First Archbishop and Primate of the Anglican Church in North America) – served as the Associate for Campus Ministry • The Rt.