www.byzcath.org Forums News & Events Church News Ukrainian Catholic Church Closings in the Coal Regions

A link the the local newspaper announcement. [republicanherald.com]

In addition to these two churches, the local Latin diocese (Allentown) announced the closing of many parishes in Schuylkill County this past weekend.

Please keep the parishioners and pastors in your prayers.

Pray also that such items as Church-Slavonic service books, old icons, and so forth are not just being discarded.

Fr. Serge

that is sad news. I hope for a new "spring-time" in all the churches but there are many factors to why there is low attendance. The biggest two is a missed generation of evangelization amongst the youth of parishes and as well the outside community. Also people re-located too much, and do not consider the parish anymore the nucleus of their spiritual life.

Here are some pictures I snapped some time ago of the church in Mahanoy City.

Here is the main article in the local newspaper concerning the recent announcement. [republicanherald.com]

Indeed the biggest problem in PA's anthracite coal region is declining and aging population. Mahanoy City's population is one-third of its mid-century population.

Saint Clair has two Ukrainian Catholic churches only 2 or 3 blocks away from each other. I was told by an archeparchial priest that the foundation of Holy Trinity (the church which is closing) had something to do with differences in cantors or something along those lines.

Indeed, as Fr. Serge recognizes, we should hope that the liturgical items find a proper liturgical home - not on ebay!

In addition there's the increasing percentage of Ukrainians who marry non-Ukrainians. In the 1930's it was less than 20 pct, now it's well over 50 pct.

If the newspaper has ONLY the word of the eparchial administrators on the reasons why these parishes should be closed . . . then one could respectfully submit that that isn't necessarily the "gospel truth."

There are so many parishes like this.

And many of them are a burden and a worry on the remaining old parishioners. Even though it is difficult for them to close the door (it was their parents church), many of these elderly (and often not wealthy) people, have sacrificed all their lives to keep the doors open, and now that they have a shrinking retirement check, and their own personal bills are going up, and physically they can't run dinners or make pirohi, so they just can't support a Church building any more. Sometimes it is the plots and plans of bishops, but sometimes it is the answer to the parishioners' prayers, when a bishop finally comes to close the door....

Nick

Shlomo Lkhoolkhoon,

This is sad news, but also a warning to all of us. That is our Churches need to be open to people coming in, not just out. Just as was pointed out here, many of the Ukrainians had married non-Ukrainians. The point should be so what. What we all have to do is evangelize-evangelize-evangelize. If the Eastern Orthodox can grow in this country among non-traditional Eastern Orthodox populations, then we need to also.

Right now, the Maronite Church in America is the only Eastern Catholic Church (outside of the Ethiopian Catholic Church) that has an African-American priest. And our eparch is working to make our Church an American Church. How many of our Eparchs are doing that?

I hope this news moves more of us to actively work to feel our Churches with new members.

Poosh BaShlomo Lkhoolkhoon,
Yuhannon

A church closing is always a sad event.

Here's an article about the closings in the RC Diocese of Allentown:

http://www.republicanherald.com/articles/2008/06/01/news/breaking_news/doc4841b264a814f468426523.txt

From my count, 49 church buildings will be closed in this process.

Dave

I'm a Coal Region boy who left -- there's no work and nothing for me there, though my heart will always be in Schuylkill County. My parents were happy to learn that their church wasn't closing, too. People get so angry and upset about this. I sympathize with them, but at the same time, I'm a realist. I know the pews are empty and these old buildings cost a lot to keep up and heat and cool, etc. Who's paying?

Now, however, you should really pray for these priests. They have to listen to a lot of flak and deal with a lot of angry people, then they get the joy of gaining hundreds of new parishioners -- imagine, you've got 100 parishioners today, and once the mergers take place, you've got 500 parishioners or even more -- The criteria for parish restructuring, approved by the Diocesan Pastoral Council of the Diocese of Allentown in September said, "The desired proportion of priests to people is 1 to 2,400." By 2009, using current projections, the diocesan ration of priests to people will be 1 to 2,382.

100 to 2,382 in 1 year. That's going to be extremely stressful.

Parishoners moving away is obviously another factor. Interesting how in the 1960's if you moved out of a city parish to the suburbs, you were looked upon with envy, while just a few decades earlier people would have looked at you puzzled and dismayed and said "You're moving away from the church"

Also, until recently people would return to the home parish for Pascha and other major feast days - and would continue to support the home parish financially as best they could.

Fr. Serge

Very sad, vichnaja pamjat'!

Ung

The Maronites have not been without their problems, either, including some failed missions and people moving away and joining RC parishes. Several parishes I have visited also are very ethnic (which for me is not a problem, but apparently is for some).

Simply making a Church "American" does not always in the end lead to good things - the Episcopal Church in the US is a case in point. I have not yet been to any Maronite church that had an all-English service, but perhaps they exist.

Shlomo Diak,

I have never said that my Church is not without its problems, but our Eparchs are trying to make us into a Church in all aspects. I will quote H.G. Robert (Shaheen):

It is simple human nature that causes many of us to be sentimental, having the tendency to look back at our Maronite history and our beloved Lebanon with great fondness. But we cannot forget that we are called to live for today and for tomarrow in a world that desperately needs to be evangelized. One of the primary ways we evangelize is though our Liturgy and the beauty of our liturgical prayers. Our traditional hymns and ancient Liturgy have been translated into English, the primary language of the United States and the language that is spoken by our young generation. It is time to renew our efforts in celebrating our Liturgy in a language that is understood by the people of our future to whom we must minister in the present. Of course, there are occasions when the Liturgy can and should be celebrated in Arabic, and this is a pastoral judgment that must be made according to special circumstances. But an all-Arabic cannot be the ordinary practice for normal Sundays when we have visitors and when our young people are present, whose first language may be English.

What I ment by making the Church American is that it is part of this culture as our Eparch above stated. I can say that you will never be to an all-English Qobono, nor would you be able to go to an all Arabic one either. Under our Church's particular laws we are required to use Syriac-Aramaic in parts of our liturgy.

As for Ethnic parishes, they are a death sentence to our Churches in America. To quote H.G. Melkite Archeparch Joseph Tawil's 1970 ChristmasPastoral Letter:

The Courage to be Ourselves

A DANGER TO THIS MISSION: THE GHETTO MENTALITY

We have not yet mentioned the principal dangers which threaten our communities and their mission to the Churches: the ghetto mentality and the assimilation process.

In a ghetto life is closed in upon itself, operating only within itself, with its own ethnic and social clich�s. And the Parish lives upon the ethnic character of the community; when that character disappears, the community dies and the parish dies with it.

One day all our ethnic traits - language, folklore, customs - will have disappeared. Time itself is seeing to this. And so we can not think of our communities as ethnic parishes, primarily for the service of the immigrant or the ethnically oriented, unless we wish to assure the death of our community. Our Churches are not only for our own people but are also for any of our fellow Americans who are attracted to our traditions which show forth the beauty of the universal Church and the variety of its riches.[/b]

We Maronites are seeking to grow (and that is not saying that other Eastern Catholic Churches are not), and the best way is to have have our hands and hearts open to our fellow Americans.

Poosh BaShlomo,
Yuhannon