Welcome to Church of the Ascension!
Church of the Ascension is a parish within the Catholic Diocese of Columbus.
Our Bishop is the Most Reverend Earl K. Fernandes.
Dear Visitor,
I would like to welcome you to Church of the Ascension's online presence! We are very excited about our website and encourage you to visit us often! Church of the Ascension is located in Johnstown, Ohio, a rapidly growing area in the State of Ohio. We are located just one mile from Intel, one of the largest microchip manufacturing companies in the world.
Church of the Ascension has been ministering to the catholic population in Johnstown since the mid-1800's when we were founded as St. Joseph Church on Jug Street in Johnstown. In the early 1920's our parish moved to South Main Street and was renamed Church of the Ascension. In 2007, we moved to our current property, 555 S. Main Street, Johnstown.
Our current building sits on 16.5 acres and was built with the intention of later adding a purpose built worship space. With the growth in Johnstown, we hope that this dream will become a reality in a short time! Join us to worship Christ our Savior and receive the Sacraments of faith in a parish that prides itself on a holy, welcoming atmosphere. We seek to live with Christ at the Center of our lives, our families, our homes and our parish! Join us!
If you're new to our community, stop by for a visit and introduce yourself to me!
May God Bless you!
Fr. P.J. Brandimarti, Administrator
Schedule a meeting with Fr. Brandimarti
To register as a member of Church of the Ascension,
please contact the parish office at
[email protected] or call 740-967-7871.
Contact Us Directions Mass Times
or by appointment
Monday, Wednesday and Thursday from 10:00 A.M. to 6:00 P.M.
Tuesday 9am-3pm, Friday 9am-3pm
If you have never been to Mass before, or if you haven't gone in a long time, we are excited to have you join us as we celebrate and worship together. We understand that it may feel foreign at first, and that some parts might seem confusing. The last thing we would want is for you to feel unwelcome during the service, so we have created a little guide for you to help you understand the liturgy a little better.
Beginning in Lent, 2022, Church of the Ascension began offering Ad Orientem Worship for our Tuesday 6:30pm Mass, Saturday 8:00am Mass and the 8:00am Masses for Holy Days of Obligation and Major Feast Days. This offers the opportunity for those who desire worship in this manner to be exposed to the beauty of the tradtion of our faith. We encourage you to check it out! The Catholic faith has a beautiful and rich history, which we at Church of the Ascension celebrate!
“Ad orientem” is Latin for “toward the East.” It refers to the direction that the priest faces during particular moments in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Historically, Catholic churches and cemeteries have always been built along an East-West axis whenever possible. This is because the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is not merely a closed-circle, communal event taking place between the priest and people, but a heavenly mystery encompassing the whole cosmos: “In the earthly liturgy we take part in a foretaste of that heavenly liturgy which is celebrated in the holy city of Jerusalem toward which we journey as pilgrims, where Christ is sitting at the right hand of God…” (Sacrosanctum Concilium, paragraph 8).
During those portions of the Mass that are addressed to the people, the priest faces the people. However, because the Eucharistic prayer is addressed to God the Father, the normal posture of the priest has always been to face with the people toward the Lord while the priest, acting “in persona Christi capitis” (“in the Person of Christ the Head”), re-presents Christ’s saving sacrifice to the Father in an unbloody manner through the power of the Holy Spirit.
Actually, no. Nowhere in the documents of Vatican II (nor in any other magisterial documents before or since) has the Church ever directed the priest to face “versus populum” (Latin, “toward the people”) for the entire duration of the sacred liturgy. In fact, the current edition of the General Instruction of the Roman Missal(the priest’s “instruction book” for Mass) presumes the “ad orientem” posture because it directs the priest to turn and face the people at certain points, implying that he had not been facing them beforehand.
While the priest’s “ad orientem” posture may seem unusual at first, with repeated exposure many people find that the “ad orientem” celebration allows them to enter more deeply into the prayer of the Mass and to focus more intently on the mystery of Christ’s Real Presence – Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity – in the Most Holy Eucharist.