HISTORIC HOUSES OF WORSHIP IN PERIL

A work studies a wide variety of causes and ripple effects of houses of worship closing their doors.

“Religious buildings,” Frank writes, “their spaces and programs, their very presence, have long been essential elements of the sense of place that grounds community life in America.” The author sees houses of worship as the centers of this extremely important sense of place, a concept that extends well beyond the specific religious intentions of the people and denominations that built them in the first place. Frank notes that this vital sense of place was often reflected even in the geography of houses of worship, which often tended to cluster near town centers or commons. He uses as his main example North Adams, Massachusetts, focusing his inquiries on the kinds of general questions such buildings tend to prompt. These questions include “What kind of place is this, and what place will it become?” And, the author asks, “who gets to” answer or even frame such questions? These queries become more pressing as local communities across America lose parishes and centers of worship at an increasing rate, with the buildings themselves being repurposed into apartments, condos, and city offices. In all of these cases, Frank probes the far-reaching effects of such closings. “Is the scale of these closings indicative of social change and accelerating dispersal of ethnic and neighborhood cohesion?” he asks. “Or do the closings themselves exacerbate these trends? Or both?”

Throughout the book, the author takes a bracing, factual tone, completely rejecting the idea that he’s indulging in mere nostalgia. The historical activities he’s engaged in, “remembering stories of the past, asking how buildings came to be, or who the people were who populated this house of worship and this community,” are, he points out, “explicitly anti-nostalgic.” Understanding this kind of history, he maintains, “is essential in planning for a constructive future.” Frank uses the case of North Adams very skillfully in order to both explore the issues and challenge his readers. He has some stern words for the callous or unthinking way municipalities—and church management teams—sometimes deal with the issues involved in closing houses of worship. When he describes, for instance, the somewhat fumbling way North Adams dealt with closing, consolidating, and renaming churches, he asks: “But a diocese” can just “announce the renovation of collective memory and the institution of new folkways?” Most of Frank’s readers have at least a few houses of worship in their own immediate settings, and perhaps many of them know of such places that have indeed been transformed into condos or office spaces. But all readers will be captivated by the author’s intelligent and unflinching insights into both the role that houses of worship play in their cities and the changes that can happen when they close their doors.

A thorough and thought-provoking examination of the roles houses of worship play in communities.