The Most Reverend Sean O’Malley,
Archbishop
of
Dear Archbishop O’Malley,
I am writing to express my sorrow
at the proposed closing of
I do not claim to be a person of unshakable faith. My questions are many and deep. But I dearly hope my children’s moral compass, and my own, will always point to Christ, and that hope is rooted in the witness of religious and laypeople in the diverse Catholic communities in which I was raised and to which I have belonged.
My wife and I taught for two
years in N’Djamena,
In these and other Church experiences, I have felt the Spirit working in and through Catholic communities—small and large—that are vibrant, caring and engaged in the world. Sacred Heart Parish of Lexington is so clearly such a community that it is very hard to see the Spirit at work in its closing.
In raising our three children our activities have focused closer to home, and Sacred Heart, to which we came nearly ten years ago, was to be the moral center from which I hoped they would someday venture forth, to the developing world or nearer, to share their gifts. My wife and I have participated in the parish ministries as religious education teacher, lectors, choir member, “Small Faith Group” members, and performer in the annual “Passio,” a solemnly mimed passion play. Seeing us involved, our children are drawn more fully into the life of the Church.
So many things contribute to
making this parish a sign of Christ’s love: the obvious caring of parishioners
for one another and the world, the good religious education from which all
three of our children benefit, the commitment to celebrating the liturgy
profoundly and joyfully in a prayerful and intimate setting, the warm
fellowship, the searching and faith-filled exchanges in our Small Faith Group.
In the Pastor and regular visiting priests, my children see the familiar and
caring faces of religious leaders who know them personally and encourage their
growth. I cannot speak directly for the outreach ministries here, but I know
that my children have learned of activities in
I believe it makes an enormous difference to the growth of my children’s faith that these signs of Christ are not disparate or lost in anonymity, nor the narrow experience of their parents, but are the outpourings of a very alive and cohesive parish family to which THEY BELONG, a sacramental home that reaches far beyond home. The unity and life of the parish is a vital and understandable sign that Christ is the one deep source of loving action in the world.
If this closure is about numbers, what words can faithfully explain the loss of that sign? This pillar of our family’s moral life, thrown down needlessly and in haste, will become a stumbling block, because the closure will act as a sign of ecclesial infidelity.
Why shatter a cohesive sign of love? Sacred Heart parish is a vibrant and viable community in Christ. Are the reasons for scattering its members truly good?