Parish in Cleveland wonders if this Easter is its last

April 9, 2009 at 12:00a.m.

CLEVELAND (AP) — The small group of mostly elderly worshippers, a polished floor creaking under their slow steps, was barely enough to fill two pews for a midweek Mass in a Roman Catholic church rich in the history of Hungarians who came to the United States for a better future or to flee communism.

Here at St. Emeric Church, drab on the outside but ornate and spotless inside, they practice their faith in the rhythms that make up a lifetime — baptisms, first communions, marriages, funerals — and all in Hungarian in a neighborhood where eastern Europeans who worked the steel mills have largely given way to Hispanics and blacks.

Heartbroken parishioners wonder if this will be the last Holy Week and Easter in a lily-decorated church they have known since childhood. St. Emeric was one of 52 parishes ordered closed or merged by Bishop Richard G. Lennon because debts are rising and the number of parishioners and priests are dropping.

“We’re praying, ’Thy will be done,’ but I keep on saying, ’Oh, please, God, in this instance hear us and please help,”’ said Ildiko Korossy, 66, a lifetime member of St. Emeric.

“We’re anticipating Christ’s Resurrection and then being faced with this,” Korossy said after a midweek Hungarian-language Mass that attracted about 15 worshippers. “It’s hard because I don’t want to turn around and lose my faith but what the bishop is decreeing is something that will impact us all the time.”

The bishop’s order, just weeks before Easter, included 20 parishes that cater to ethnic communities such as the Irish, Italians, Hungarians and Slovaks.

The pattern of closings has emerged across the country, sometimes leading to protest vigils and church occupations. The closings reflect population shifts as Catholics and other city residents move to the suburbs and, increasingly, to the country’s South and West.

The Cleveland Catholic population is one-third of its 1950 level, and the city’s overall population has dropped from about 914,000 to about 400,000. There have been similar dramatic shifts in other urban areas of the eight-county diocese of about 753,000 Catholics and 224 current parishes.

The diocese has 257 active priests, compared with 565 in 1970.

St. Emeric, founded in 1904, was burned out once and moved in 1925 to the current location between the busy West Side Market produce arcade, a public housing high-rise and a commuter rail line overlooking the downtown skyline. Most of the blue-collar neighborhood is made up of aging houses, small businesses, restaurants and bars.

The church interior is brightly adorned with statues and images of saints in Hungarian history. A ladies group has a sewing club in a former classroom, and downstairs the kitchen and meeting hall host Hungarian-American celebrations and visiting VIPs from the homeland.