CROIX, LA. — French Catholic newspaper founded in Paris on 16 June 1883 by the « Maison de la bonne presse », under the impetus and direction of the Assumptionist Vincent-de-Paul Bailly. A popular daily, under the sign of the Crucifix, La C. sought to be exclusively Catholic, without political ties of any kind, and wholly dedicated to the triumph of the Cross through obedience to the Church and active support for the finest works of the apostolate.
Numerous associated publications and significant satellites flourished around it, such as La C. du dimanche (1889), which was directed chiefly toward rural populations; Le Cosmos, la C. des Marins, Le Laboureur, Les questions actuelles, the Mois littéraire et politique, the Noël, the Pèlerin, the Sanctuaire, the Echos d'Orient, the Annaire pontifical, l'Etoile Noëliste, l'Action catholique, la Documentation catholique, Bayard, Bernadette, A la page, Jérusalem, Rome, l'Eucharistie, Notre-Dame, l'Union des Églises, Belle-jeunesse, Prêtre et Apôtre, to mention only the principal ones.
Among Fr. Bailly’s collaborators, both on the editorial staff of La C. and in the various publications of the Bonne presse, we may recall Joseph Ménard, M. Tardif de Moldrey, Abbé Maze, Msgr. A. Battandier, Fr. Adéodat Debauge, Bernard Bailly, Ernest Ollivier, Fr. J. E. Droschon, Abbé L. Pagès, and the illustrious Msgr. E. Loutil, known under the name of « Pierre l'Ermite ».
The anticlerical measures of 1900 imposed substantial changes on the imposing publishing complex. Paul Féron-Vrau generously placed himself entirely at the disposal of the Assumptionists in order to save their valuable Catholic printing works, which thus continued to prosper, despite repeated attempts at persecution, thanks to Fr. François d'Assise Bertoye, who habitually signed himself « Frane », and later also thanks to the newspaper’s director, Léon Merklen, while bishops and pontiffs did not stint on their encouragement. In 1932 the fiftieth anniversary of La C. was lavishly celebrated in Paris, and in 1936, on the occasion of the congress held in Rome, the Bonne presse was able to demonstrate the extent to which it had served the Church and the country.