IT WAS A SAD DAY last Sunday June 22. Another major church in Kitchener closed its doors for the last time after Sunday’s last service at St Joseph’s Roman Catholic Church. Although I am not Roman Catholic, I am a little sad. I never find joy when a place where God was worshipped is shut down. The reason for the closure is the same as that in other churches in the city that have closed in recent years: a dwindling congregation of parishioners is unable to keep up with the cost of maintenance not to mention the capital expenditures to update the old building.
St. Josephs has stood at its present site at the corner of Madison Ave and Courtland since 1953 although the parish has existed since 1930. Between 1930 and 1953 the congregation worshiped in various temporary locations including the basement church until the upper church was completed.
For me St. Joseph’s holds a childhood memory. When I was a school aged youngster, our family lived in the neighborhood of St. Joseph’s church. Promptly at noon each day, the church bells would ring. For Catholics that has a special significance. It is a reminder to pray the Angelus which commemorates the Annunciation of the Angel Gabriel to Mary that she would give birth to the Saviour. But for me it was the signal to stop playing and get ready for lunch followed by afternoon kindergarten at Courtland Avenue School (which was a primary school at the time). I don’t know whether they still ring those bells, which could be clearly heard in the whole neighborhood.
What makes this closure difficult for St Joseph’s parishioners is that they did not make this decision – it was made for them by the diocesan Bishop – the same entity that created the parish in the first place back in 1930. The parishioners have launched a desperate appeal to the Vatican, which is where the “buck stops”. So far, they have not received a response.
As mentioned before, numbers were the key factor in the decision – dwindling attendance at mass and dwindling finances coupled with rising costs. At last Sunday’s final mass over 400 people were in attendance. Apparently, many of these were former parishioners, some of whom reflected on their past memories afterwards. One could only wonder whether the decision would have been different if some of these former members had stayed.
I have written about church closures and the reasons for them in another blog post found here.
I don’t know the situation at St. Joseph’s, or whether any of the reasons that I mentioned apply to them, but still I find it sad.