Tension Follows [New Orleans, Louisiana] Archbishop's Mass

The (New Orleans) Times-Picayune ^ | May 25, 2008 | David Hammer

[Ebenezer]

During Archbishop Alfred Hughes' first pastoral visit to Our Lady of Good Counsel Church since announcing plans to shut down the 121-year-old Uptown Catholic institution, he tried to calm parishioners' nerves with a joke Saturday afternoon.

After exchanging the traditional greeting of "Peace be with you . . . and also with you," Hughes got his broken microphone to work long enough to quip: "The priest made the sign of the cross and said, 'I think something's wrong with the microphone.' To which the congregation dutifully responded, 'And also with you.' "

The parishioners at Out Lady of Good Counsel laughed, but many made it clear before and after Saturday's Mass that they do, in fact, find something wrong with the archbishop's leadership.

[Ebenezer]

ping

[stevem]

When a parish can’t survive these days I think you can blame demographics 100% of the time. It’s almost never the fault of the archbishop, unless he deliberately installed a pedophile and the parish has been sued out of existence.

[livius]

It’s the fault of lack of evangelization. These parishes have people living in them, most of whom are black and don’t go to any church, but the Catholic Church has been sitting around lamenting the disappearance of various immigrant ethnic groups rather than going out and trying to bring in anybody who happens to be passing by on the street at the moment...which is the attitude you have to have.

Most bishops seem to think they have been appointed simply to be the people left behind to turn out the lights.

[PAR35]

At least one of the parishes being closed in New Orleans is Black. The parishioners are now in Baton Rouge, Dallas, Houston, etc.They are upset by the closing, but they aren't going back.