About 12 parishioners, all over retirement age, went inside to the pews, sat down and refused to leave.
“This week, the Archdiocese sent a locksmith to close down our church. We will not allow it,” Virginia González, who has come to this church for 50 years, firmly said.
“They cannot change the locks if we are inside.”
Except, of course, they did.
And put up chain link fence, too, to keep them out.
And put up chain link fence, too, to keep them out.
As the pedophile scandal was gaining momentum in 2008 over 400,000 left the Roman Catholic Church.
The number of priests nationwide has fallen by over 20%.
The church has sold off and closed parishes to pay out almost Four Billion Dollars in settlements to child molestation lawsuits, just in the past half century.
This Church of St. Roch was founded in 1899.
Its current location on Wales Avenue was completed in 1932.
It was shuttered and chainlinked in 2014,
a forced relocation of about 600 of the faithful.
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