Pending Sale of Chicago Church to ‘Temple House’ Developer Raises Concerns Among Local Catholics and Canonists

The National Catholic Register ^ | 6/27/23 | Jonathon Liedl

[marshmallow]

An entrepreneur who previously turned a Miami synagogue into a venue that hosts ‘same-sex weddings’ and other scandalous events is trying to buy the shuttered St. Adalbert Church.

CHICAGO — Ever since their parish was suppressed in 2016, former parishioners and others connected to St. Adalbert Church in Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood have tried to keep the church building in the community’s hands. But now, St. Adalbert members are facing the prospect that not only might they lose their bid to reacquire the church and keep it as a place of worship, but that it might be put to use in sacrilegious ways.

A developer who turned a Miami synagogue into an event venue that hosts “same-sex weddings” and was the site of a reported “simulated orgy” is currently the lead candidate to buy the historic Chicago church, which celebrated its last Mass in 2019.

The potential sale has left some Chicago Catholics connected to the former parish, once the pride of the Chicago Polish community and more recently home to a mostly Hispanic congregation, upset that what has taken place in the South Beach venue may soon be happening in the Pilsen neighborhood church where they received the sacraments and worshipped God — making the sale not just a blow to their bid to reopen St. Adalbert, but a possible violation of Church law that governs what is done with unused churches.

n a video taken over Memorial Day weekend and obtained by the Register, Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich confirmed that Daniel Davidson, a self-described “serial entrepreneur” who bought the Knesseth Israel synagogue in 2003 and converted it into the Temple House event center, is in the process of purchasing St. Adalbert.

“All I know is that the parish there at St. Paul’s has decided to go ahead and.........

[Southside_Chicago_Republican]

It's a shame any way you look at it. In St. Louis, the historic St. Liborius Church was sold some years ago and became an skateboarding venue. Here is where I assume the altar used to be:

It burned down this week, and maybe just as well.

[Paladin2]

Thank Pope Marx....

[Dilbert San Diego]

It’s a sad trend of the times, but Catholic church attendance has plummeted in recent years, which has prompted them to consolidate Catholic parishes and close some churches.

Perhaps other denominations face the same problem. If there are not as many people attending services, there is less need for the real estate.