{"id":2911,"date":"2010-07-04T14:56:13","date_gmt":"2010-07-04T19:56:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/?p=2911"},"modified":"2010-12-20T23:55:20","modified_gmt":"2010-12-21T05:55:20","slug":"church-is-it-the-bishops-the-people-or-buildings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2010\/07\/04\/church-is-it-the-bishops-the-people-or-buildings\/","title":{"rendered":"Church: Is it the Bishops? the People? or Buildings?"},"content":{"rendered":"

For many traditionalists the bishops (along with the pope) are the heart of the Church. For many liberals, its the people who are important. However, as recent church closing show, for many parish members the church building is the highly emotionally charged symbol at the center of being Church.<\/p>\n

The Cleveland Diocese recently finished closing 50 churches. The Plain Dealer<\/em>\u2019s editorial covers the situation here <\/a>in a manner sympathetic to the diocese. (It is not the New York Times<\/em> or the Boston Globe<\/em>!).<\/p>\n

To get a real feel for the pain on the ground, check out this blog<\/a>, especially some of the past posts.<\/p>\n

The closing affected some parishes which are very liberal, in terms of\u00a0 liturgical style and social programs. It affected some very traditional parishes. Most of all, the closings hit ethnic parishes. The people who are protesting the closings are a rich stew of Catholic diversity.\u00a0 Very liberal and very traditional Catholics work very amicably with each other in their opposition to the closings.<\/p>\n

The bishop had hoped to celebrate the closing Mass at all affected churches. In cases in which this was done, it occurred with a strong police presence. In some cases the only people who went to the final Mass were protesters and the curious. Some of the final Masses were simply cancelled, because the people and pastor had already held their own final Mass without the bishop. The closing Masses ended up becoming a strong symbol of the fracturing of the relationship between the bishop and the people, almost the exact opposite of their intent and the liturgical ideal.<\/p>\n

Prayer vigils are the one positive item bringing protestors together. This has occurred in other dioceses. Some elsewhere have been going on for years. Why is prayer so important? And why do these prayer vigils seem to arise as things get really hopeless? And why do they continue for so long?<\/p>\n

Church buildings are not just physical places like any other, but places of prayer. Perhaps that is what is so threatening about their closure. It is interesting that many of the ethnic parishes link these closings to the closings under Communist rule. Perhaps the prayer vigils are affirmations that no one can control their praying, not even by taking away their places of worship or their\u00a0priests.<\/p>\n

John Rakosky
\nConcord Township, Ohio<\/p>\n

Jack Rakosky has an interdisciplinary doctorate in psychology and sociology, and spent twenty years in applied research and program evaluation in the public mental health system. His current main interest is voluntarism, especially among highly educated people at retirement age.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Cleveland Diocese recently finished closing 50 churches.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[357],"tags":[486,847,483],"class_list":["post-2911","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-demographics-and-sociology","tag-diocesan-restructuring","tag-diocese-of-cleveland","tag-jack-rakosky"],"yoast_head":"\nChurch: Is it the Bishops? the People? or Buildings? - Home<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2010\/07\/04\/church-is-it-the-bishops-the-people-or-buildings\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Church: Is it the Bishops? 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