Whenever the story of church closings calls for comment from the Diocese, what transpires falls short of dialogue.  We get talking points.  Below are just a few of the more familiar talking points and my responses to them:  

• Talking point 1: The church closings are addressing a shortage of priests.
  • Kansas St. James and United Parishes both acknowledge that there is a shrinking population of ordained priests able to serve all of the parishes in the 19 county Toledo diocese.  However, there is still a sufficient number of priests to provide Masses at all of the parishes by restructuring the Mass schedules and making more efficient use of priests’ time.  Several lay people have created alternative Mass structures that would allow for all parishes to remain open; yet these proposals were not even considered by the bishop or his staff.  They won’t tell us why they have rejected our proposals, and in fact won’t even tell us that they’ve considered them at all or offer a reason why any of our proposals should be rejected.  They just tell us that they have evaluated the data and made their decision. 
  • And it is a very poor decision.  When you begin to look at the big picture, and consider what the problems are and how they are being addressed, it becomes painfully obvious that the priest shortage and the closing of parishes are not really linked in any meaningful way.  Using St. James as an example, I can point out that the Diocese will not realize any gains as far as priest shortages are concerned from the closing.  If all 222 members of St. James were to attend other churches, then the existing pool of priests would still have the same number of parishioners to attend to.  So all that is being saved is 1 hour out of a 168 hour week by closing down our entire parish.  Other than that, the priests will have the exact same amount of workload minus a 1 hour weekly Mass.  Saying Mass does not even scratch the surface of a priest’s overall responsibilities.  So I hope that they are going to make that one extra hour very productive because they still have just as much work to do after that.  Was that one hour worth sacrificing communities in such a way that they no longer have access to a local parish? Perhaps priests can use that one extra hour giving the elderly and disabled a ride to their now distant parish, and help them into a church that is not designed to be easily accessible to them.  Or perhaps they can use that one extra hour to help ODOT clear the highways during winter storms so that parishioners can make their longer and more dangerous trip to church more safely.  Or perhaps they can use that one extra hour to try and organize a transportation network for parishioners to attend to their own sick and ailing, since the new and larger congregations will be comprised of people who do not live close to each other.  These are just a few of the many things that our priests will need to be doing with all of the extra time (1 hour per week) that they are saving by closing down entire parishes.  With that in mind, consider this question:  does closing churches address the priest shortage; or is it just a short-sighted reaction that creates more problems than it solves?
• Talking point 2:  The church closings are necessary due to population shifts.
  • Kansas St. James increased in attendance in the 8 years prior to being closed in 2005.  Mass had filled the St. James sanctuary for many years on a weekly basis.  Which population shift is being addressed by closing St. James?
• Talking point 3:  The restructuring allows for all Catholics to attend a nearby parish.
  • If all of the members of one closing parish were to move as a group to the nearest open parish, there would not be enough room in the majority of them to accommodate everyone.  Furthermore, there is no guarantee that the elderly from a parish such as St. Louis in Toledo will have easy access at another nearby church; as pointed out by a St. Louis parishioner who had her concerns ignored by the diocese. 
• Talking point 4:  The Diocese understands that this is painful for parishioners.
  • While St. James and United Parishes are indeed living out the very unfortunate reality that this is a very painful experience, the Diocese demonstrate that they are out of touch with their flock if they believe that this is our primary reason for opposing church closings.  We are able to recognize that this action by the bishop is a mistake with disastrous implications for the future of all Catholics and indeed all Christians.  By the time the Church hierarchy realizes that they have plotted the univeral Church on a path toward self-destruction, it will be too late to repair the damage that has been done.  We are trying to prevent it from getting that far.  In fact, it could be argued that we are trying to help the hierarchy to continue to exist; as we argue against bishops and "Task Forces" which seem determined to phase out their very reason for existing. 

At the time of St. James closing in 2005:

• There were 24 parishes in the Diocese with less attendance than St. James, of that 15 of those parishes were not on the “recommended to close” list.
• Three parishes in Seneca County had less attendance, less Baptisms, less Marriages, etc. the only exception is deaths (which those three parishes have higher) and they were not on “the list”.
• for the previous 7 years, of the 14 parishes in the Fremont Deanery, the total attendance of the 12 parishes, which were not recommended for closing, had decreased 22% without a single parish increasing, while, the two parishes on the “Recommended to Close List,” St. Casimir and St. James both had actually increased their attendance.
• Of the MJM Cluster, since 1998, Gibsonburg had decreased their attendance by 28% and their financial picture had decayed substantially.  Millersville had decreased in attendance by 27% and their financial picture had decreased as well.  Kansas, St. James had increased in attendance and increased financially 385%.
• In the Fremont Deanery, Mass attendance had dropped 46% since 1970. There should have been a study done of what parishes are increasing in attendance and what parishes are decreasing and why.