NORTHAMPTON (MA)
The Republican
By Fred Contrada, The Republican
NORTHAMPTON — A group of parishioners from a discontinued Northampton church has filed suit against the city, attempting to invalidate a new ordinance that allows closed churches to be reused for commercial purposes.
The Committee to Preserve St. Mary of the Assumption Church, Inc. maintains that an ordinance passed by the City Council last month did not go through proper procedure and should be reversed. The ordinance cleared the way for some commercial use of churches in residential zones.
St. Mary’s was among several Northampton churches that were closed by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Springfield in 2009 and consolidated into a single parish on King Street. The parishioners at St. Mary’s, however, have hired lawyers in Rome to plead their case for reopening the church to the Vatican.
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