This post may be a mess, as I am using my phone to create it.
Today some good folks in the Archdiocese of Cincinnati were treated on Facebook to the worst sort of scare-mongering about the ongoing Beacons of Light plan to reorganize parishes in preparation for a new focus on evangelization. They saw a story about the church above, being demolished. Obvious implication: this is what Beacons will mean to your church. Resist!
Here is a genuine offer of a wager, not just rhetoric: without knowing the story of the church above, I will bet real money that the church you see being demolished was poorly maintained and out of money. No doubt lots of bad decisions as well. Lots of candidates for blame. But a church is not often demolished when it is well cared for. Why do that?
That was a serious question. Why would a bishop order the demolition of a well maintained, well funded church? I know people believe bishops are both evil and stupid, priests too, but tearing down a well funded, well maintained building is a special sort of stupid. There is NO benefit. Nope, not even a payoff of money.
Were there no reorg plan, none, there would still be unfunded, falling-apart properties. If the local community cannot or will not keep up the property, then what? Many times, people are shocked to find out what it really costs. They expect or hope to sustain these beautiful buildings on volunteer help. It is a nice dream, but it generally doesn't work. Maintaining buildings well costs serious money and it gets worse when it is deferred.
It is also not hard to discern whether the working out of the reorg in your particular setting bodes well or ill for continued maintenance of your beloved buildings. ASK WHAT THE PLAN IS. There it is in five words.
Few are the pastors who are driven mad by parishioners brandishing wads of cash saying, we insist you keep our buildings in top shape. If you want to brighten the future of your beloved church building, help the plan for ongoing maintenance. Help secure funding.
And, when you ask, where is the plan, it is possible the pastor will say, I can't get to it because I am forced to do triple the administrative jobs, because people are fighting the streamlining plan. Maybe next year, or the next pastor.
Yes, that's right -- there is a connection between the consolidation of organizational structures -- which those fearing church demolitions are resisting -- and the pastor's ability to do long range planning.
The untold story of the last 20 years or so is that pastors were forced into impossible administrative situations, and one way they coped was to postpone indefinitely the sort of long-term planning so badly needed. Organizing a capital drive for buildings is hard work, but oh so easy to put off till "later." As a result, pastors tended to focus more on the short term.
The current reorg plan is intended to forestall the tragedy in the photo above. It may not succeed in all cases. But it takes a special sort of stubbornness to think this problem was created by Beacons, and if only we went back to the status quo of 2019, all would be well.
I am not asking you to trust me on this, or to trust higher-ups. Just ask: why is it in any way smart to demolish well maintained, well funded, well attended churches?
What bishop wakes up saying, "I am bored. I could go to a movie!
"No, wait. I think I will go alienate a faithful community for no reason. I will gain nothing from it. The money will evaporate. They will hate me forever. Many will leave the faith. That is such a better way to spend my day!"
These are real questions. Please answer them if you can. My answer is that bishops and priests like everyone prefers to avoid pain. If a community is thriving and has a well maintained church, the obvious course is show up for the festival, smile, and then LEAVE THEM ALONE. But really smart people tell me, oh no, that's crazy talk. The double secret protocol is totally uncalled for shutdowns that reap no benefit, because...
1 comment:
The example of a Catholic church being demolished is relevant because it just happened. And it is happening to three of the church buildings that were clustered together in recent years. The circumstances may have been very different (or very similar) to circumstances happening in some of our families of parishes in the Cincinnati Archdiocese, but it is certainly no more irrelevant to the conversation than noting that what happened at St. Stanislaus in St. Louis could happen here. Submitted with love, respect and prayers.
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