BREAKING: New York announces parish mergers; Holy Innocents spared—UPDATED

Last updated on: September 30, 2016 at 3:42 pm by Deacon Greg Kandra

BREAKING: New York announces parish mergers; Holy Innocents spared—UPDATED 2016-09-30T15:42:46-04:00 Deacon Greg Kandra

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From The New York Times:

Cardinal Timothy M. Dolan announced on Sunday the largest reorganization in the history of the Roman Catholic archdiocese of New York, with 55 parishes from Staten Island to the Catskills to merge with neighboring parishes.

In 31 of those mergers, all Masses and other sacraments such as weddings and funerals will cease to be celebrated on a regular basis at one of the churches being merged. In the remaining 24 mergers, both churches will remain open for the regular celebration of Masses and other events.

Of the churches that will essentially be closed on a weekly basis for worship purposes, nine are in Manhattan, six in Westchester, four in Staten Island and six are in Rockland, Sullivan, Ulster, or Dutchess counties.

The churches that will cease to be used regularly in Manhattan include Holy Rosary, Holy Agony, and Saint Lucy’s in East Harlem, and Our Lady of Peace, Saint Elizabeth of Hungary and Saint Stephen of Hungary on the Upper East Side.

In the Bronx, churches no longer used regularly will include Visitation on Van Cortlandt Park South and Saint Ann on Bainbridge Avenue. On Staten Island, they include Assumption on Webster Avenue and Saint Mary of the Assumption on Richmond Terrace. In Westchester, they include Most Holy Trinity and Saint Denis in Yonkers and three churches in Mount Vernon — Saint Ursula, Sacred Heart and Our Lady of Mount Carmel.

Parishioners in some affected parishes have already begun mobilizing to save their churches, and legal action and additional protests are expected before the decisions are set to start taking effect in August 2015.

Some churches that had been recommended for mergers by an advisory panel earlier this year were spared after parishioners raised objection Among them are Holy Innocents Church in Midtown Manhattan, the only church in New York where the Latin Mass is celebrated daily, and St. John’s Church in Piermont.

“This time of transition in the history of the archdiocese will undoubtedly be difficult for people who live in parishes that will merge,” Cardinal Dolan said in a news release announcing the changes. “There will be many who are hurt and upset as they experience what will be a change in their spiritual lives, and I will be one of them.”

Read more.

UPDATE: A spokesperson contacted me this afternoon to note that “these are mergings, not closings.” The Archdiocese has posted a complete listing of affected parishes on its website:

“This time of transition in the history of the archdiocese will undoubtedly be difficult for people who live in parishes that will merge. There will be many who are hurt and upset as they experience what will be a change in their spiritual lives, and I will be one of them. There is nobody who has been involved in Making All Things New who doesn’t understand the impact that this will have on the Catholic faithful. It will be our responsibility to work with everyone in these parishes so as to help make the change as smooth as we possibly can.”

Read the complete announcement.

There’s also local reaction from some parishes:

Father Robert J. Verrigni of Saint Ursula said the closure is like a death but he is telling his parishioners that not only the diocese, but God is leading them in a new direction.

“It’s very very sad to see these people,” he said. “A woman came out, she said she’s here 59 years. She knows no other place.”

In 2007, the Archdiocese closed or merged 21 parishes and in 2013 it reorganized its schools. Westchester now has 83 parishes, Rockland has 18 and Putnam has five.

The new reorganization will be phased in by Aug. 1. 2015. A small number of new proposals for parish mergers will be decided in the next several months, the Archdiocese said.

At Saint Bernard Church in White Plains, which had been told it might merge but in the end was not on the list, parishioners Danuta and Don Zamora were happy and relieved as they walked into 9 a.m. Mass Sunday. They had sampled several churches before picking St. Bernard. They liked its diversity and that it seemed to be growing and thriving.

“We just moved into the area and we were just extremely hopeful that the church would stay open,” Danuta Zamora said.

Members at St. John’s in Piermont had dug in for a fight, starting a petition to keep the 162-year-old church, a graceful red-brick edifice on the shores of the Hudson River, from merging with a neighboring Nyack congregation, St. Ann’s.

On Sunday, their prayers were answered.

“There is a huge sense of relief,” said Peter Colquitt, 53, who works on Wall Street, as he left the 9 a.m. Mass. “I was married here. My two daughters were baptized here.”

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