Our Lady of the Rosary Parish, Windsor – St. Anne Parish, Windsor
No later than 31 October 2007, both Our Lady of the Rosary Parish and St. Anne Parish will close. The territorial boundaries of these two parishes will be absorbed into those of neighboring parishes. This assignment of the respective territories will be decided in the near future upon consultation with the Deanery of Windsor.
A ride past OLTR from the waterfront recently showed some of the neglect of the bell towers.
Earlier this summer the church was allegedly hit by lightning, and as it is slated to close, no one seems to care about how crappy it looks in its current condition.
Years of sucking cash, but not putting a dime back. It sounds like the Catholic Church and Windsor Utilities have a lot in common.
This is the church I was married in, and from a personal point of view, once she closes (after 100 years), I’m done.
On the right tower/steeple what happened to the ornament at the top, any idea ? Or is that the result of the lightning strike ?
Rich, until recently, both towers were topped with crosses too.
It wasn’t that long ago both towers were restored.
Sadly, most parishes are quite poor. But if the vatican would open their coffers (and also allow priests to marry or bring them over from Poland where there is a massive amount of priests) I don’t think we would have such a problem. Sad times in the Catholic Church today where the parishioners are not heard but told how important they are.
Maybe they should put their money where their mouth is both literally and figuratively.
Ya, early 1990s those towers were in the parking lot being restored….such a rapid decline seems strange.
If the church closes, you’re done with the Church, or done with your marriage?
Just the Church, I’m still happy with the marriage. 🙂
Another sad one is Holy Name of Mary. They just spent all that money restoring it to turn around and close it. It really is a shame.
It’s too bad that Holy Name of Mary is closing. I’m not surprised. The municipal unions and city hall have treated the taxpayers like cash cows for too long and those that can afford to leave are heading for Tecumseh, Lakeshore and LaSalle and taking their churches with them. The same thing happened in Detroit back in the 1980’s when dwindling church attendance forced lots of churches in Detroit to close. Personally, I don’t think anything short of an armed uprising against city hall and CUPE will change the way things work in Windsor. You’re going to see more churches in the city close as middle class taxpayers flee for county.
CUPE’s new campaign: “Lost your church yet? Keep worshiping in the county!”
I for one would welcome a box-store mega church in the county as long as there’s acres of parking and access off the 401.
I may have missed something because I don’t live in Windsor anymore — but how is CUPE responsible for this, and the sprawl out, in a direct way?
Well, Shawn, first CUPE unionized all the ushers in Windsor, allowing county churches to have a greater edge and lower manpower costs. Then the county churches started bringing in Korean organs while the city churches were forced to use CUPE issue domestic pipe organs that kept breaking down and going out of tune. Finally, it was CUPE’s demand for a 15 minute coffee break after the Second Reading and shift premiums at high masses that put the final nail in the coffin. George can fill ya in on the rest…
i was wondering why they had the area under the steeple with no top on it taped off one day. i thought maybe it fell off, but lightning makes sense. that was a month or so ago, maybe more.
my website is no more today… took it off due to personal reasons.
John, I’m curious about something. Who was excluded from the CUPE agreement in Windsor Churches? Couldn’t the role the ushers filled be staffed by non-ushers like Priests, nuns, volunteers, temps or anybody else, or did that go against the UNION agreement. Were priests and nuns also unionized in Windsor?
I thought that low attendance and closings were to due to Charles Sylvestre and the lawsuits against the London Diocese from him and the spiraling insurance premium costs because of it.
No…. priests, nuns, etc. cannot fill the role performed by ushers even temporarily as it is bargaining unit work under the terms of the collective agreement. One time a priest at Christ the King accepted a donation from a parishioner after mass and the ushers union steward found out and initiated a grievance against the diocese that went all the way to the OLB. Real ugly mess that was.
Jeeves, how many Catholic churches are being closed in the county? Churches, like retail and manufacturing, follow the people. There are a lot more people moving from Windsor into the county than vice versa. People are moving to the county because taxes are lower and municipal services are better than what they get in Windsor. Unlike the city, Tecumseh and LaSalle are not afraid to contract out municipal services to a private business if the private business can deliver the same service at a lower cost. That’s why taxes are lower in the County.
anyone who thinks ushers are unionized with `mandatory coffee breaks`obviously is not seeing the sarcasm in john`s comments…..
What’s happening in the religious community (of which I am no part) is exactly what’s happening in the educational community. The investment in mega-structures on the city’s periphery at the expense of established inner-city infrastructure. For some reason, it must be more appealing to be a number in some institutional complex that resembles a fertilizer factory (J. H. Kunstler) as opposed to community-based heritage buildings where everyone knows your name (Norm).
One of these days, this society will figure out it took a wrong turn somewhere down the line, but regretfully, it may be too late to turn around.
Brian, what sarcasm? Are ushers unionized or not? I guess if the Catholic schoolboard is unionized, they could influence whether the catholic churches in Windsor can get unionized. Because if CUPE did unionize the Catholic Churches in Windsor, then CUPE is really REALLY pathetic. Servants of God are not meant to use the Catholic Church to get rich. That’s why Henry VIII did away with the Catholic Church in England. And, now all the Catholic Churches are being shut down in Windsor.
/sarcasm OFF
Jeeves, Henry VIII was excommunicated by the pope. As they say today, the door “slammed on his ass on the way out”. He set up the C of E with him in charge so he could make the rules affecting his marriage woes. Nothing to do with “Servants of God”. There was nothing altruistic about his actions in that time in history.
As far as catholic churches closing – it’s mostly because there aren’t enough priests to go around. Many of the now closed churches were filled on Sundays and had overflowing offertory baskets but couldn’t stay open because they had one priest running around saying mass at several parishes. One by one, the diocese has been merging these parishes into “faith communities”. At the rate they are going, I can see one centralized superchurch serving the whole city. It’s not pretty either, especially in this case such as Andrew’s church, which is historically very important to Windsor. Shutting it down is just one step away from going after Assumption or St. Anne’s next.
John, the marriage response for Henry VIII being excommunicated by the Pope is open for debate. A lot of kings were unfaithful. The Churches normally turned a blind eye to this stuff if a King was involved. It’s interesting that 60 years prior to Henry VIII’s reign, the witch hunts started and were headed by the Church. It extended from Ireland all the way to Germany. If a nobleman was tortured for a confession for witchcraft, guess what happened to his estate?? All of it went to the Catholic Church. For the next 300 years, over 110,000 were accused of witchcraft by the Church and half of them were executed.
So, you think Henry VIII’s marriage was the real reason he formed the Church of England with him being the head of it?? Bullsh-it. Henry VIII wasn’t going to stick around and see all his noblemen plundered by the Catholic Church.
Yep. ole Henry VIII was an all round great guy. Thanks for the history lesson.
I was told by a friend that Al Capone had donated a large light up cross to this church during prohibition and it was used as a signal by rum runners. Does anyone know if that story is at all true?
I’ve always thought that that church looks out of place next to that big parking lot. Or maybe it’s the other way around.
Kevin, close. It was a parishioner at the time who donated it (his name escapes me). Apparently he made quite a bit of money rum-running, and this was his gift to the church.
It just so happened that this light up cross served as an excellent navagatiional aid on those foggy nights 🙂
Hey Andrew. First many thanks for the B + W photo of USCG Station Belle Isle.
Your work is much appreciated, and having lived on the Straights of Detroit for most of my life, it is indeed a real treasure. My very close friend Ted Larkin spotted the post , and was very enthusiastic about the old building. We lived 2 doors down from each other, and spent as much time as we could on the river.
I could not thank you sooner, as I was too busy stuffing Imodium into my mouth, for relief of sometype of plague. Your photo cheered me up. Back to the Imodium, C P
Of all the church closures in the city of Windsor, this one is the saddest of all. It is truly a shame that the Catholic Bishop couldn’t see his way in keeping this beautiful building open. It is also a shame that we don’t appreciate great architecture and that someone hasn’t stepped in to save this magnificient sructure before it reaches the point
where it can’t be salvaged. The interiour is unique with the wood carvings of angels and the murals on the ceiling. It has been a beacon on the waterfront since the church wase erected in the first decade of the last century. I just hope that some investor buys this building and finds a use for it.
Kevin and Andrew, I just took the tour at Hiram Walker’s and the tour guide said that it was Al Capone that donated the cross. Also, he said that occasionally, while Capone was in town, he would ask the priest for a few minutes to speak to the congregation. He was usually looking for some men to load barrels of whiskey for him and they would paid top dollar (a few months wages in those times) to do it. When word of Al Capone being at Mass spread, the church would be packed!