It Sounds like we have a Plan…

From the October 27 bulletin of St. Paul the Apostle church:

“In the Making All Things New process all parishes in the archdiocese will be involved in working with neighboring parishes to assess their strengths, name their concerns, and explore how they can work together to bet- ter serve the People of God. While understanding that change is inevitable, and that in some cases parishes and building will close, they will be asked to suggest a future model or models of parish life. Models might include parishes sharing a pastor or pastoral administrator; 2 or more parishes working closely together; or, 2 or more par- ishes joining together to form a new parish.
In Manhattan, the model will be parish closings. Manhattan currently has 89 parishes. The goal is to re- duce the number of parishes to 62. With parishes sometimes only several blocks apart to the north, south, east, and west, it is less easy to conclude where the majority of the faithful will worship when parishes are consolidated.”

(By the way I had heard this figure of “60” mentioned some two years ago in connection with the Archdiocesan plans for church closings in Manhattan, but in a different context.)