Massachusetts Congregation Vacates Building Nearly 12 Years After Closing Decreed by Archdiocese

The Wired Word for the Week of June 5, 2016

In the News

"It turns out that if you tell the people for 50 years that they are the church, they start to believe it and they start to act on it, and think they have the authority in a way to argue with the hierarchy."

That's the comment of James O'Toole, a professor of history at Boston College, speaking about the nearly 12-year-long vigil parishioners maintained at St. Frances Xavier Cabrini Roman Catholic Church in Scituate, Massachusetts, after thearchdiocesan hierarchy decreed that it, along with some 75 other churches in the archdiocese, should close and the properties be sold.

The intention was that the members of the shuttered congregations would join other parishes in the archdiocese, but the people at St. Frances, who felt strong ties to each other and viewed St. Frances as their spiritual home, weren't willing to do so. At the time, eight other congregations took a similar position, but St. Frances was the only one still holding out.

Since the date in 2004 when the archdiocesan leaders ordered the closings, members of St. Francesparish used a sign-up sheet to ensure that at least one person was in the building at all times, while the congregation pursued every legal means available -- including moving through the U.S. legal system and an appeal to the Vatican -- to stop the closure. Members kept the church continuously occupied for 4,234 days.

Now, however, the U.S. Supreme Court has declined to hear their case, and the members of St. Frances held their final service last Sunday.

In an official statement, the archdiocese again said it hoped the congregants would join other parishes. "Their sense of loss from the closing of the parish is understandable," the statement said. "For this reason the archdiocese kept its commitment to allow the appeals process to conclude both in civil and canonical courts."

The decision to shutter the churches, attributed by the archdiocese to a decline in the number of priests and congregants, as well as to the cost of maintaining so many buildings, was issued when the archdiocese was in the midst of the clergy sex abuse scandal, which started in Massachusetts, and then spread around the world. A year earlier, the archdiocese had agreed to pay $85 million to settle almost 550 lawsuits.

The archdiocese doesn't say that the sales of the churches is related to the scandal, but settlements in those abuse cases led to financial problems, and many church members and observers believe it's a significant contributing factor to the closings.

Since no priest was assigned to St. Frances once the official close date occurred, lay people have led the services ever since, using communion wafers secretly consecrated by sympathetic priests. The congregation's final service last Sunday, though, was led by Rev. Terry McDonough, an ordained Catholic priest who was put out of the ministry because he had chosen to marry.

The members of St. Frances are planning to continue as a worshiping congregation, meeting in a Masonic lodge until they can acquire a building of their own. They have announced plans to form a new "Catholic community" church in Scituate, which will operate outside of the authority of the Boston archdiocese and be partly led by Father McDonough.

In a statement, Terrence Donilon, a spokesman for the Boston Archdiocese, said, "The most important step we can now make as a Catholic family is to continue to work toward reconciliation. Despite our disagreement over the closing of the parish, we have never lost sight of the fact that we share a commitment to follow Jesus Christ in and through the Roman Catholic Church .... With the conclusion of the vigil, we endeavor to memorialize the spiritual home that was once St. Frances X. Cabrini Parish."

The vigilers see it differently. As one of their members, Jon Rogers, put it. "This is not a death, but the birth of a new church and a new way of thinking. We are the bright light our world needs, and I pray that we burn forever."

More on this story can be found at these links:

Parishioners Say Farewell to Scituate Church. Boston Globe 
A Nearly 12-Year-Long Vigil Ends, and a Massachusetts Church Closes. New York Times 
After 11-Year Vigil, Massachusetts Catholic Church Holds Final Service. NPR 
The Friends of St Frances X Cabrini, Inc. Facebook 

Applying the News Story

In responding to this news story, we are likely to have some empathy for the vigilers who held out so long in their church building. All of us who are regular churchgoers, regardless of our denomination, can likely identify with the members of St.Frances, who wanted to maintain their community of faith within the walls of the building where so many significant milestones in their lives were marked. As one member of that church put it, "It has the sweat of my family members in the bricks. I had my first communion here. There's been weddings here. There's been funerals here."

Nonetheless, in closing the church, the archdiocese was acting within its legal rights. A Superior Court judge ruled that according to the way the Roman Catholic Church is organized, the archdiocese was the legal owner of the church property and had the right to evict the parishioners occupying the building. That ruling was upheld by the state Appeals Court, and when the U.S. Supreme Court was asked to hear the case, the justices declined, which suggests that they saw no problem with how the lower courts had ruled.

Still, the actions of the St. Frances parishioners raise the question of the nature of a congregation: Is it a people in a building or a people whether they have a building or not?

We recall a statement that seems relevant by David Platt,  president of the Southern Baptist Convention's International Mission Board, and the author of The New York Times bestseller Radical: Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream. He said we've taken Jesus' Great Commission (Matthew 28:19-20) instruction to "Go, make disciples, and baptize" and turned it into "Come, be baptized, and sit in one place"!  

The Big Questions

1. If your church building burned to the ground, would you rebuild it? Why or why not? How might your answer change if there were another congregation of your denomination nearby that you could easily attend?

2. Is it possible you might be missing the will of God by rebuilding? Is it possible you might be missing the will of God bynot rebuilding? How might you know?

3. If your church building burned to the ground, would the people of your town or city who are not part of your congregation miss it? Why or why not?

4. Considering questions 1 and 3, which one, if either, is more revealing about what it means to be a church? Why? Or are both equally important and if so, why?

5. What possible good might come out of some churches in a given area closing?

Confronting the News With Scripture and Hope
Here are some Bible verses to guide your discussion:

Jeremiah 29:12-14
Then when you call upon me and come and pray to me, I will hear you. When you search for me, you will find me; if you seek me with all your heart, I will let you find me, says the LORD ... (For context, read 29:1-14.)

These words of God were communicated to Jews in exile in Babylon in a letter to them from the prophet Jeremiah. The Jews had long associated God's presence with the temple in Jerusalem, but when exiled, they were separated from the temple (which the Babylonians eventually destroyed).

But in exile from their religious building, as Jeremiah suggests, the people discovered that they could still be a people of God, could still study the scriptures, could still pray and be heard by God. In fact, in exile, the synagogue system was born, some of the biblical texts were put into their final form, and there appears to have been a significant reduction of idolatry among the Jews.

Their God, they found, was not locked into a "place."

Question: What are the advantages and disadvantages of congregations identified with specific buildings?

Ephesians 2:19-22
So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are citizens with the saints and also members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the cornerstone. In him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built together spiritually into a dwelling place for God. (For context, read 2:11-22.)
1 Peter 2:4-5
Come to him, a living stone, though rejected by mortals yet chosen and precious in God's sight, and like living stones, let yourselves be built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. (For context, read 2:1-10.)

The New Testament has very little to say about church as a place, but quite a bit to say about the church as an assemblage of people. In fact, there is no place in the New Testament where "church" translates into any reference to a building: It is always to an assembly or multitude.  (The English word "church" derives from a post-biblical Greek phrase "house of the Lord," and only later merged with the biblical Greek concept of an assembly of Christians.) The two passages above are examples.

Questions: According to the Ephesians verses, Christ is the cornerstone of the church. How should that betangibly expressed in a congregation? What does it mean to you to be a "living stone" in God's "spiritual house"?

Acts 12:12
…[Peter] went to the house of Mary, the mother of John whose other name was Mark, where many had gathered and were praying.
Romans 16:3-5
Greet Prisca and Aquila, who work with me in Christ Jesus, and who risked their necks for my life, to whom not only I give thanks, but also all the churches of the Gentiles. Greet also the church in their house ….
Colossians 4:15
Give my greetings to the brothers and sisters in Laodicea, and to Nympha and the church in her house.
Philemon 1:1-2
Paul, a prisoner of Christ Jesus, and Timothy our brother, To Philemon our dear friend and co-worker, to Apphia our sister, to Archippus our fellow soldier, and to the church in your house ...

In the New Testament, the few passages that refer to the church as a place are connected to individuals' private homes -- homes that evidently were large enough to host groups of people gathering for worship, prayer and study.

TWW team member Frank Ramirez, who is a pastor in the Church of the Brethren, comments, "The Brethren originally worshiped in house churches, and only gradually went to meeting houses that were low maintenance and resembled houses, not churches. Now, most of our congregations meet in buildings that require maintenance and upkeep. But they can be essential to our group identity as well. The Amish in our area meet in house churches. The benches are moved from one home to another depending on whose turn it is to host church."

Questions: To what degree is the house-church a useful model for the church today? To what degree is it an inadequate model for the church today?

Add up your church's building maintenance, utilities and the other expenses, and ask what would it be like to meet as the New Testament churches did, as a network of house churches and not as one church. (When Paul writes to the church in Rome or Corinth or Philippi, he is writing to a confederation of house churches). What could you do with the money you spend on the building for the ministries of Jesus? On the other hand, what ministries and what part of your identity would not be possible if you did not have a building? How is your building linked with the identity of the community?

Hebrews 10:24-25
And let us consider how to provoke one another to love and good deeds, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day approaching. (For context, read 10:19-25.)

The writer of Hebrews doesn't mention specifically in what sort of location the Christians should "meet together," but meet together we should, he says, "to provoke one another to love and good deeds."

Questions: In what ways does going to church provoke you to love and good deeds? How might your practice of discipleship be less faithful without "meeting together," and why?

For Further Discussion

1. Is it possible that God uses church closings to bring attention to our need for community with him?  

2. Because of certain clergy in the Boston archdiocese sexually abusing children -- or protecting those who did -- some people stopped going to church. What message might those people have learned from the long vigil of the people of the St.Frances congregation? Might it have helped them to reconsider? Why?

3. TWW team member Mary Sells comments, "One thing I seem to say to myself often is, 'Don't let your religion get in the way of your faith.'" How much must you be in agreement with your church or your denomination to still remain with that church and be true to God?

4. Discuss this, from TWW team member Frank Ramirez: "Around 20 years ago I spoke with a fellow pastor whose church had burned down. She told me that she got the call in the middle of the night and went to the church and met fellow parishioners in the parking lot to live through the grief together. She was met by a local priest whose church had also burned down a few years before. He told her she might not understand it now, but this could be the best thing that ever happened to the church.
     "Her church went through a discerning process about whether to rebuild or move and had a vote that was almost a tie. They realized they didn't have consensus yet, went through another discerning process, realized they were deadlocked and made a near unanimous decision to move to another location, build a handicap-accessible building that accommodated their ministries, and they never looked back. It had been wrenching at first to think about leaving behind all the memories, but now there are new memories and new ministries."

5. In our "In the News" section above, we cited this comment: "It turns out that if you tell the people for 50 years that they are the church, they start to believe it and they start to act on it, and think they have the authority in a way to argue with the hierarchy." Why should we believe we are the church, and what authority should that give us?

6. Respond to this, from TWW team member Charles Alkula: "When I was stationed in Cornwall [England] with the U.S. Navy, I regularly preached in tiny Methodist chapels across the Duchy. One, St. Kew Highway, had a grade 2 (historic) building where John Wesley himself [Methodism's founder] had personally laid the cornerstone. Yet having a building that drained resources became too much for the remnant [of the once flourishing congregation] to handle, and so the decision was made to sell the building to the nearby golf course. The chapel took that money, gave it away for mission projects, and now rents space each Sunday in the village hall (which, unlike the chapel, has heat, air conditioning and is accessible). They've seen a growth in numbers attending services and in ministry to the community, which now sees the chapel as being engaged in its neighbors' lives."

7. Comment on this, from TWW consultant James Gruetzner: "While I don't find anything in the New Testament instructing Christians on how they must organize themselves -- congregational, presbyterian, episcopal and other polities might work in various places -- Jesus does note that he is present when any assembly of 'two or three' Christians gathers (Matthew 18:20). That said, I found it interesting -- and inconsistent -- that some members of the (former) St. Frances X.C. parish believe that they can form a 'Catholic community' while being in rebellion against the local archdiocese, since Roman Catholicism (as well as some other Christian groups) believes that the historical episcopate (the line of bishops beginning with the apostle Peter and extending to the present) is the only way the church can be organized.

Responding to the News

This is a good time to think seriously about your answers to these two questions:

• If your church burned down, why would you rebuild it?
• If your church burned down, would the community miss it?

We can't answer those two questions without prayer, but they belong in our thinking. It's a good idea to ask ourselves those questions every couple of years or so, for they can help us determine where ministry and mission of each congregation needs to be expanded or changed.

Prayer

Thank you, Lord, that the church is so much more than a building, but that a building can sometimes be a place of spiritual learning, growth and service to others. Help us to keep a proper perspective on our houses of worship so that our first priority is always to do your will. In Jesus' name. Amen.