September 13th, 2026
Dear Diary,
We closed St. Casimir’s today. The canon law people said “Relegated to profane but not sordid use.” Nobody talks like that except canon lawyers. The finance people have been on me about the place for years. Leaking roof. Ancient boiler. A handful of families. Collections that would barely cover lunch at Taco Bell. We held meetings, commissioned a study, then another study because people didn’t like the first one. Old Fr. Ernst at St. Matthew’s said he was happy to keep covering it… for the people. I signed the decree in June.
The communication office girl wrote for the paper about “transitioning the faith community into a new pastoral reality.”
Msgr. Tommy disapproved. He said there are groups which could take it over and bring it back to life. I said that we had had studies. He said, “It means closing their church, Atticus.” He called me Atticus. He’s never done that before. I told him we had to be realistic. “Reality includes people,” he said. I hate it when he does that.
There were 14 old people and a few young families with kids at the final Mass. Farmer types. No protesters or reporters. Just people waiting for me.
The church was spotless. Somebody had polished every pew, every bit of brass. It smelled like wax and polish and incense and the stainglass windows lit it up with colors … like when I was young. In the sacristy Fr. Gilbert showed me the parish’s chalice. It had a dent near the base. The inscription underneath said Dedit Familia Nowak, 1931. I think “Dedit” was “gave”. During the depression. Mrs. Kowalski who was in the sacristy with us said her mother helped collect the money when she was a little girl. Children brought pennies to church. Farmers gave eggs and chicks and milk and butter which the sisters sold in town. “They were poor,” she said, “but Father needed a chalice.” It kinda belonged to everyone’s parents and grandparents.
My homily was about buildings not being the Church, communities change, memories remain, new pastoral realities. All the stuff. I almost believed it myself.
After Mass, Fr. Gilbert and some people carried the chalice and vessels and vestments and the Blessed Sacrament to the car for transfer to St. Matthew’s. The people knelt as Our Lord passed. When we returned, the little altar boy snuffed out the red sanctuary lamp. A tiny thread of smoke rose and disappeared. St. C’s had the Blessed Sacrament for 124 years. Then it didn’t.
On the way out in the narthex a little boy asked, “Where will Jesus live now?” I said that the Blessed Sacrament was going to St. Matthew’s. He nodded, but it think maybe that that wasn’t what he meant. I think he meant there at St C’s. Then I noticed a picture frame in the entrance with an arrangement of photos.
FROM THIS PARISH
9 PRIESTS
13 SISTERS
8 BROTHERS
PRAY FOR VOCATIONS
One of the photos was a very young smiling Fr. Ernst. I didn’t know.
Outside, Mrs. Kowalski showed me the graves of her parents, grandparents and her husband. Then she gave me a dish of purogi. She had heard I liked them. I closed her church and she brought me food.
Should we have tried harder? I don’t know who “we” is. Or maybe I do.
On the drive home Fr. Gilbert asked if I wanted to stop for supper. I said no. I reheated the purogi later. They were very good, but couldn’t finish them. I sorta lost my appetite. I keep thinking about that little red lamp.
Crying. I hate to see a church close. It is terrible, even when nothing else can be done.
Pray for vocations. They are starting to come again. He can multiply loaves, and He can multiply priests too.
We had a Confirmation at Mass today. God is good.
Very sad, & very unlike previous McBP posts. Ten years ago our good Bishop here in NH invited the FSSP to reopen an already closed, old Polish church. The FSSP sent one of their very best (IMO) priests; he started with a congregation of curiosity seekers, and now has 1200+ (& growing) parishioners. Weekly collections are well into the 5 digit range & two additional priests have been added. Well attended daily Masses as well as three Masses on Sunday, Vespers in the afternoon. Professional quality choir, men’s schola, & children’s choir. Active K of C, & numerous youth groups. Extensive physical renovations to the buildings, paid for by generous benefactors & the congregation.
Yes, Bp. McB, “we” should have tried harder, just for that little red lamp.
For once, that’s not a funny +Atticus story. That hit me like the last episode of Blackadder.
Serious humour is the most gutwrenching.
*also, I remember a chalice from my parish church when I was younger as an altar server. It was a simple gilt-covered one; but soldered/melted onto it was a beautiful set of a woman’s jewelery that had obviously been donated – including a diamond-encrusted wedding ring that some smith had managed to circle the stem without deforming the ring; there were gems and so on on the base – I believe the story was in the parish that they were the jewelry of a priest’s deceased mother, or the jewelry donated by a man whose wife had died. I remember there was a dent in the base of the chalice. Such items have great value – not in the monetary sense; but I feel they are the best humanity can offer the Lord.
Painful, so very painful. Our Lady of Sorrows, pray for us.
Many years ago the local paper where I live had an article about the Catholic elementary school that had been in town until shortly after Vatican II renewed the church. It was a private school for African Americans in a segregated society. If it was as good as the one in Huntsville AL, into which white students began enrolling after Alabama’s segregation laws were ruled illegal and became the first voluntarily integrated school in the South, it had to have been an excellent school. Those nuns who thought they needed to leave teaching underprivileged children to pursue social justice (I guess on a cosmic scale) were sorely mistaken. I wish these orders of nuns that barely exist today and never admit they made a mistake by thinking pursuing political or social justice was superior to actually doing something for the poor were half as insightful as Bishop Butterpants.
i always had found mirth in +Fatty’s reports before today. this time i was duly saddened. and i rather wanted to use him as a punching bag.
@JackinNH, that is our go-to parish when we visit family in NH. It is wonderful to have it there, especially since Northern New England generally has a dearth of traditional Latin parishes. I am glad that it is flourishing.
Fr Z this was powerful.
They took away the things that made the church beautiful, then they took away the church.
Someone tell the Bishop about the Shrine of Christ the King in Chicago. It had been “de-consecrated” and was ready for the wrecking ball when Cardinal George let the ICKSP take it over. (Earlier in its history, the building had been a Shrine for the Little Flower, and sine she’s a secondary patron of the Institute, I like to think she was saving her own shrine to offer to them.)
This one hit home, hard.
This hits too close to home for me. Been through it, initially albeit at a distance…but the difference is, I sold my home 300 miles away and moved back to the city where the church was and joined the board of the group pledged to reopen it. Been spending the last 7 years focused on ensuring it doesn’t die.
It was closed, never returned to ‘profane’ use (they didn’t know what to do with the building, a registered national landmark). That was a plus. We developed a renovation plan, business plan, set goals, liturgy guidelines (say the black, do the red) and divided the work up.
Last Mass was on a Feast of Christ the King. People were crying as the standing room only Mass ended. We signed a lease to take over the management, renovations, and operation 7 months later, and reopened the doors on the 113th anniversary of the church’s original dedication by the Vatican representative to the US (at the time). The novena to the patroness, which had been held continuously since 1872 (Andrew Johnson was President!) continued without pause that year. Unbroken. This year’s novena and feast Masses filled the lower shrine including folding chairs (the upper church is starting renovations this year) and the procession was one side of a city block long and took over a half hour to go around the block the church is on.
The water leaks have been fixed, the marble stonework is being repointed. Local contractor donated close to 200K to repair walkways and drainage. We have a steady stream of pilgrims every day, the Eucharist is reserved in the Shrine, and we’re working on finalizing having one Mass a week (during the week so as to not draw from the parishes that are left, most of whom are struggling also).
I claim no credit for any of the above. It’s all in the hands of the Lord, I’m sure, being nudged by our patroness. I have come to believe that what may seem to be the end of something may actually be the beginning of a better outcome.
At least we got to it before they sold it to get torn down to become a parking garage for the hospital across the street (which was founded by the parish, now under control of a university health conglomeration) or condos.
But this story struck very close to home.
This story is all too real. No mention of what will happen to the stained glass windows, the statues in the church, and the organ.
One church in Boston was sold to the NE Medical Center, which in turn flipped it to real estate developers and is now a condominium. The outside is landmarked so that statues and religious symbols are still there.
I also know a World bank official, who loves music, who founded a company which buys up the church organs from the increasing number of closed parishes, restores them and sells them at a profit.
I foresee a change in his Episcopal motto. It will read Nisi Dominus aedificaverit domum, or, perhaps, Cor Contritum et Humiliatum?