Since the Reformation in 1578, when the Catholic religion was banned and suppressed, the church has been used for Protestant worship.
After the parish church of St. Nicholas burned down in 1415, it was decided to enlarge a Marian chapel and use it as a church. The 14th-century building was given a new choir with an ambulatory, a transept, and a tower that surpassed that of the St. Eusebius Church in Arnhem in height, making it the tallest in Gelderland.
A large part of the church was lost when the tower collapsed in 1797, destroying part of the nave. The remaining part of the nave was subsequently enclosed by a new facade in a sober Louis XVI style, under the direction of Teunis Wittenberg, the architect of the Zutphen Quarter.
The Great Church stands on the Church Square, close to the boulevard.
