I suppose it was inevitable. Blessed Sacrament School in the Bronx was not the only New York Archdiocese school having economic problems. So, the decision was made to close the doors on Blessed Sacrament and many other schools. It is my belief that the closing of the churches will come later.
As I told a priest colleague twenty years ago, when I taught at a Catholic school, who proclaimed that Catholic schools would have to be closed down because of economics, that once the schools close down, the churches would close down ten years later. This was before the pedaphile scandals.
Now, the Church will argue that the scandals had nothing to do with closing the schools, but we all know better. It's not just the settlements with the victims, who, by the way, should be first in line to claim that Vatican art and gold. It's the generations of Catholics that have excommunicated the Church. Millions have stopped or never started attending mass. They have stopped giving which is more important to the future of the Church. When the American Catholic Church can no longer support itself where will Rome turn to?
Without Catholic schools in America there will be no new Catholics. There is already a critical shortage of priests to warrant consolidation of churches. What will it be like in twenty years when all the schools have been closed? Instead of closing schools the Church should be opening new ones.
The schools have always been the missionary outposts for Catholicism in this country. For generations of Catholics who proceeded to Catholic high schools and Catholic colleges, it was the parish elementary school that set them off on their journey. How long will Catholic colleges and universities be able to recruit sufficient classes without the elementary schools to initiate the thousands of potential applicants in the value of a Catholic education?
The decision to close Blessed Sacrament and the other schools in the New York diocese is but another example of short term solutions creating long term problems.
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