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Definite Problems, Possible Solutions

Here is a start to some "brainstorming" about why Sacred Heart of Vailsburg has fallen into such trouble, and how we might address and overcome the problems. It includes things we might want to include in this website, as well as ideas or projects that different groups or committees of concerned citizens might want to work on. This is just a start to ideas that might carry the day, a takeoff point for our readers' own thoughts.

In "brainstorming", people do not censor themselves, but put ideas out for everyone's consideration, on the premise that what may sound a little crazy or impractical might not be so crazy after all, and even if it is, it might produce a more sensible idea in people who hear it.

So please read thru the random thoughts below, and if you think one or more of them have value, encourage us to pursue them, and perhaps add your efforts to making them work.

If something strikes you as interesting but not quite right, let us have your suggestions as to how it might be improved.

History of the Church.

History of Vailsburg and the exodus of former parishioners.

Comparison to St. Lucy's, which has kept ties to parishioners even after they moved to the suburbs.

How Can We Keep the Church Open?

• Fundraising by the SHV parish and Archdiocese for SHV:
• Giving Tree; one is already in place but blank; looks new; good idea, started too late? At what level of giving would someone get an inscribed "leaf"?
• Buy-a-Brick, with an online order form, for a brick walkway in place of the sidewalks and areas of the parking lot along all sides of the church.
• Bingo nites or afternoons — has that been tried?
• Events in parking lot; flea market, carnival, art and music festivals. Overflow could use the lawn of St. Mary's Villa opposite.
• Church fair (rides, approved vendors, jugglers and juggling instruction — circus arts instruction, etc., etc.).
• Art, music instruction for kids and adults; senior center; CYO; Knights of Columbus.
• Organ recitals, choral concerts.
• Readers' suggestions.
• Bringing Catholics to Vailsburg — Portuguese, Brazilians, Hispanics, Filipinos, Indians (from Catholic areas of south India), empty-nesters now in the suburbs.
• Closing St. Joseph's instead of SHV if the two parishes are to be merged.
• Encourage Archdiocese to hold various church events for central Essex County at SHV.
• Ecumenical services, multiple languages: French: many Haitians in Vailsburg may attend Protestant services because they are in French, even tho they are actually Catholic or disposed to become Catholic if they had services in French at SHV.
• Ecumenical outreach; permit small storefront churches of various denominations to hold services in SHV on a regular or rotating schedule; say, eight churches rotating one service a month, with two different storefront churches having services in SHV on Sundays during hours when Catholic services are not being held. That way, (a) SHV staff would be able to assure security of church property and (b) there would be opportunities for the different communities to mix in passing between services, and thus establish comfortable, relaxed, interdenominational goodwill and a feeling of community. Depending upon the length of services, there might be as many as six or eight services on Sundays and two on Wednesdays, Fridays, or other days.
• Letters/Suggestion Box
• Fundraising by website; requires bank account, and PayPal or merchant account to accept credit-card payments if that is advisable; must have trustworthy person to receive donations: For the resistance; to pass along to the Archdiocese for the benefit of Sacred Heart of Vailsburg and particular SHV projects.

What You Can Do

• Write to or call the Archbishop (website can provide email, postal mail, and phone contact info).
• Write to or even phone the Pope (website can provide email and phone contact info).
• Sign a petition.

• Write (emailed) letters to the editor of local, state, regional, and national newspapers and magazines, including but not limited to Catholic media.
• Urge media to investigate the Archdiocese's bad faith, to ask hard questions such as "Why would you keep the parishioners in the dark rather than ask for their input, suggestions, and donations?"
• Demonstrate outside SHV, outside the Basilica, outside Archdiocese offices.
• Confront the Archbishop about not alerting parishioners seven years ago to pick their brains and seek partnership in solving the problems without closing the church.
• For the SHV church council: confer with St. Casimir's parishioners/resisters (who successfully fought back an attempt by the Archdiocese to close that Ironbound church).
• Is there a church basement in which things like bingo, socials, Sunday school and other kinds of educational programs could be held?
• Satellite image.
• Morph program to soften church completely away?
• Ecumenical services, in multiple languages (English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Tagalog)
• Bring in Filipina nurses who may work in Newark hospitals but live in Jersey City, and their families.

The No. 1 bus can tie together not just the Ironbound (with its Portuguese and Brazilian Catholics) and Vailsburg, but also Vailsburg and Jersey City (with its various Catholic communities from distant places), since it goes from Downtown Jersey City, thru the Ironbound, all the way to within 4 blocks of SHV.

Perhaps the Church should direct more of its efforts at evangelization to competing for Christians within Christian countries, instead of just giving up on bringing American Protestants back into communion with the Roman Church, as the Eastern Rite churches were reunited with Rome. Certainly Protestants have no problem trying to alienate Catholics from Rome, here in the United States and elsewhere in the Americas. If Protestants can raid Catholics, why not the other way around? Protestant evangelicals seem to operate on the basis that "What's mine is mine. What's yours is negotiable." No.

Uses for the SHV structures if the Archdiocese insists on closing the church

• Rent out convent and rectory for offices, art galleries, artists' studios, music and dance teachers.
• Create an arts-exhibition and concert space in all buildings, with a permanent Vailsburg Museum area.

There is no commercial reason to tear the church down for a parking lot, skyscraper, or auditorium/theater. Vailsburg is not Manhattan, and there is neither need nor demand for alternative uses for that space in this low-density area 4 miles from Downtown Newark.

[As mentioned in the "Newark USA" blog:]

"Perhaps there's even some competing [Catholic] church body, such as that group that wants to restore the Latin Mass, that would be able to keep SHV open as a traditionalist outpost in a sea of change for the sake of change."

One last thought:

Who knows? There may even be some Protestant megachurch out of Texas or Colorado that would love to have a great church as an outpost in the urban Northeast.

Other pages on this website: (Home.) Bad Faith, and Fiduciary Duty. Links to Allied Websites. Contact Us.