Goodbye Holy Redeemer

The parish council at Our Lady of the Americas Parish has voted to close two of the cluster's churches and to consolidate at the third church.

Holy Redeemer/St. Francis Xavier and Mt. Carmel churches will close this fall, and Corpus Christi Church will remain open, but be known simply as The Church of Our Lady of the Americas Parish.

The pastor, Father Vincent Panepinto, said that at Corpus Christi there will side shrines devoted to St. Francis Xavier and Our Lady of Mt. Carmel, and that the Holy Redeemer also will be represented in the sanctuary.

He said the parish is also trying to determine if it will be financially feasible to move the 110-year-old marble altar from St. Francis Xavier Church to Corpus Christi . That altar formerly resided at St. Patrick’s and Sacred Heart cathedrals, and was first used by Bishop Bernard J. McQuaid, who founded the diocese. There's a bit of history I hope won't be lost.

The Corpus Christi facilities are in the best shape. Financially, it was logical to centralize operations there.

As I've noted previously, I have strong ties to Corpus Christi, even though I stopped attending there in the early 1990s when it strayed away from the Roman Catholic Church.

But I also have ties to Holy Redeemer.

In 1976 when I was a seminarian, I stayed at the parish for the summer. The pastor, Father Ted Metzger, was away most days - if I remember correctly, he was taking classes - so our contact was not as frequent as I would have liked, for I enjoyed the times we did talk. A good and gentle man.

The rectory has a coupula where I used to like to sit and read and pray. Even then I liked my solitude.

The coupula helped to inspire my first published poem, "The Widow's Walk."

It was at the parish that I also first tried my hand at being a liturgical musician.

It was also at that parish that I realized that I was called to a married vocation, not the priesthood. Father Metzger was the first person I told.

The old rectory was long ago torn down. The church was sold and the parish moved to St. Francis Xavier, which was later joined with Mt. Carmel and Corpus Christi.

Now even Holy Redeemer's name will be gone.

I understand what's happened to city parishes. It's happening not only here in Rochester, but in cities across the U.S. Populations shift to the suburbs and it becomes financially impossible to keep the old city churches open. But that does not lessen the sadness old-time parishioners will feel. And even though I was not an official parishioner, the news brings back memories and a certain wistfulness.

I wonder if there will be a fund to help move the marble altar? I'll have to check on that.