DENVER (CO)
Crux from Associated Press/Lansing State Journal
August 9, 2020
By Craig Lyons
Lansing – Parishioners of St. Casimir Catholic Church lined Sparrow Avenue on Aug. 2 getting one last sight of the parish many called home for decades.
Bishop Earl Boyea tied a red ribbon around the doors, leading the crowd of parishioners in prayer one last time.
“I now pronounce this church closed,” Boyea said.
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The parish first hinted at possibly closing its doors in December, telling parishioners that the dwindling population and lower volume of donations could not sustain St. Casimir. The Diocese of Lansing had planned to review all its parishes’ operations this year.
“Over the last 100 years our parish has been through its ups and downs. Through it all, the Lord has always had a plan for us. Now we have come to the end of those plans,” Pung wrote in a letter to parishioners this spring. “With declining priest numbers and changing demographics, we are no longer able to sustain a healthy, vibrant parish life that will meet the spiritual needs of its people.”
Only about 380 parishioners attend Sunday Mass at St. Casimir, which is lower than other Lansing parishes, the diocese said.
St. Casimir’s would be the first Catholic church closed by the Lansing diocese in almost a decade. It shuttered Holy Cross parish in Lansing in 2009. The Vietnamese Catholic community purchased the building as reopened it as the Parish of Saint Andrew Dung-Lac in 2011.
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