Parish Closings Update

Catholic parishes fight draft closure list

Parishioners and neighborhood leaders are making last-ditch appeals to save some of the Catholic churches that would be closed under a sweeping plan of mergers in north St. Louis County and south St. Louis.

If approved by Archbishop Raymond Burke, the plan would close 30 parishes, although the churches at four of them would be preserved for such functions as Spanish or Latin Masses. It would be the largest wave of parish closings in the history of the Archdiocese of St. Louis.

The plan would spare St. Francis de Sales, known as the Cathedral of the South Side because of its 300-foot steeple, by making it regional home to Latin Masses. The Masses now are celebrated at St. Agatha, which is marked for closing. Anheuser-Busch Cos. Inc., next door to St. Agatha, said in a statement Friday that it never had expressed an interest in buying the parish property and "would be sad to see it close."

Over the weekend, members circulated a petition to try to save St. Agatha.

Full Post-Dispatch article here.