3 Roman Catholic churches to close in Society Hill, West Philly, Northeast

Three Roman Catholic churches in Philadelphia — including one of the oldest historically German parishes in the U.S. — will no longer serve as worship sites because of mounting financial pressures, the Archdiocese of Philadelphia announced Sunday.

Closing are Holy Trinity Church, in Society Hill; Saint Rose of Lima Church, in the Carroll Park section of West Philadelphia; and Our Lady of Ransom Church, in the Castor section of Northeast Philadelphia.

Holy Trinity, at Sixth and Spruce Streets, was founded in 1784 by German-speaking Catholics and built in 1789. It merged with Old Saint Mary’s in 2009. According to the archdiocese, Mass has not been celebrated at Holy Trinity since 2017 because of deteriorating flooring. It would cost as much as $1 million to repair the floor, reroof the structure, and install a new heating and air conditioning system, officials said.

“An attempt to cover those costs would deplete the savings of Old Saint Mary Parish, effectively jeopardizing its financial stability and precluding any necessary or deferred maintenance to the main parish church,” an archdiocese spokesman said in a statement. It is unclear what will happen to the structure.

The two other churches also face financial strain, officials said.

“This is an organic process that has arisen from the parishes,” said archdiocese spokesperson Ken Gavin. “It’s not a top-down process where senior archdiocesan administrators make the decisions. It has come up from the local level.”

Each parish may weigh how to divest itself of the properties. The announcement by the archdiocese ensures that the buildings will maintain dignity in whatever use they are put to in the future, Gavin said.

Saint Rose of Lima, at 59th Street and Lansdowne Ave., became subsumed within Wynnefield’s Saint Barbara Parish in 2013. The church building on Lansdowne Avenue has not been used for church services since then and has tallied nearly $100,000 in debt. The archdiocese is considering ceding the church property to the Independent Mission School, an independent Catholic school that occupies the rest of the site.

Our Lady of Ransom, at 6700 Roosevelt Blvd., has been effectively closed since July 2017 when it merged with Resurrection of Our Lord Parish. In the last two years, the debt for Our Lady has climbed to about $86,000.

The closings follow numerous others. In December, Archbishop Charles J. Chaput approved the closure of the Our Lady of the Holy Souls church building at 19th and Tioga Streets, in Tioga, which became part of Our Lady of Hope Parish in 1993; the Saint Stanislaus Kostka church, in Coatesville, which became part of Saint Joseph Parish in 2012; and Saint Leo church in Tacony, which became part of Our Lady of Consolation Parish in 2013.

In May, Chaput approved the mergers four parishes in lower Northeast Philadelphia. Saint Adalbert Parish, Saint George Parish, and Mother of Divine Grace Parish were combined with Nativity B.V.M. Parish effective July 1.