Archdiocese defends arrests at S. Natick vigil
Pastor's decision to call police angers residents

By Michael Levenson
Boston Globe
December 26, 2004

http://www.boston.com/news/local/articles/2004/12/26/
archdiocese_defends_arrests_at_s_natick_vigil?pg=full

Natick -- As the Archdiocese of Boston yesterday defended a pastor's decision to call the police to break up a vigil at a South Natick parish, Catholics and Protestants in town said they were shocked, hurt, and angry that the church would take such an aggressive step on Christmas Day.

Two of the five parishioners who had begun occupying Sacred Heart Parish with sleeping bags and food on Christmas Eve were arrested shortly after midnight when they refused to leave the sanctuary. They will be charged Tuesday in Natick District Court with trespassing, police said.

The parishioners, Anne Green and Leo Ryan, had been hoping to keep the church from closing today, under the archdiocese's plan to reconfigure and merge parishes across Greater Boston. The final Mass at Sacred Heart, which opened in 1890, is scheduled for this morning at 9.

Across Natick, residents strolling in Santa hats and walking dogs on a brilliant Christmas Day said they were shaken by what they described as the needlessly hard-line tactic taken by Sacred Heart's pastor, the Rev. Joseph W. Slyva, who called the police to have the parishioners removed.

The action marked the second time a parishioner protesting the closing of Catholic churches has been arrested. A 69-year-old Woburn man was arrested in early in November when he refused to leave Immaculate Conception Church in Winchester, but the trespassing charge was later dropped at the request of the archdiocese.

"There is something that's just so ironic about arresting people in church on Christmas Eve," said Nancy Echlov, 52, who was walking in front of Sacred Heart yesterday with her husband and their golden retriever, Fenway. "I'm sorry, but that's just outrageous."

"It's a church," Echlov said twice, shaking her head in dismay. "We're not talking about kicking somebody out of a bar." Her husband, Rick, 53, who, with his wife, attends an Episcopal church in Wellesley, added, "It's a shame. And this is South Natick. It's not like some place with rabble-rousers all around."

Neither Green nor Ryan could be reached for comment yesterday, and Slyva did not return phone calls or answer the rectory door. But Larry Rasky, a spokesman for the archdiocese, stood by Slyva's decision, saying the pastor consulted with church leaders and was concerned about a vigil disrupting Christmas morning Mass, which was celebrated yesterday by about 50 parishioners, without incident, the archdiocese said.

"The pastor made a decision that he had to consider the interests of the 750 people who had been there for the Mass earlier in the day and the crowd that was anticipated for the next morning," Rasky said. "That was a decision he had a right to make. And in our view, he made the right decision."

Rasky said the archdiocese has not decided whether to drop charges against Green and Ryan. "As you know, the archdiocese did ask for the charges to be dropped in Winchester," he said. "I don't know exactly what will transpire here."

Slyva briefly addressed the issue at the 9 a.m. Mass. In a written statement released yesterday, the archdiocese said: "Slyva recognized the hard work and emotional challenges so many of his parishioners have been through as they have prepared for Sacred Heart's closing and thanked them for the dignity and grace they brought to the Christmas Masses."

Joe Gozzi, 40, a parishioner at St. Patrick's Parish in downtown Natick, said Slyva made the right decision in calling the police. "If [there are] parishioners there, they should understand that, no matter what, there are rules and regulations to anything, whether it's religion or being a good citizen," Gozzi said. "They should have known there'd be consequences for their actions, definitely."

Outside Sacred Heart, parishioners Mike and Barbara Collins said they were upset by the arrests. They know Green and Ryan personally from church. "It's horrible," Barbara Collins, 47, said. "It's awful that [Slyva] would think of doing that. They were just a taking a stance of how much they love this church."

Mike Collins, 50, a Santa hat perched on his head, nodded in agreement. "The church should be open for everybody all the time," he said. "It's not like they were causing any trouble or posing any threat to the church." Still, he said he was not surprised that Slyva decided to remove the parishioners. "He's not been real supportive of keeping the church open," Mike Collins said. "He hasn't been our advocate, and that's sad."

When police arrived at the church in the first minutes of Christmas Day, they found five parishioners inside; they persuaded three to leave, but Green and Ryan refused to go, in an act of protest, Green and police said. "I just had no choice," Green, 54, said in a tearful interview on her cellphone Saturday morning, moments after being arrested. "I could have left. But my conscience could not allow me to do that."

Green's great-grandfather dug the cellar of the church, her grandfather served as an altar boy, and she and her mother were both baptized there.

"There's no need for it," said Jim Hannon, 42, who described himself as a lifelong but shaken churchgoer. "The Catholic Church is more than well financed and has enough public relations, that this should have been handled before it got that far. It's a fiasco."

Outside Sacred Heart yesterday, Bob Gee, 45, who attends a Congregational church, gazed up at the slate spire set against the blue sky and said he hopes the parish will be preserved as an example of architectural history, as well as a home for the people who pray there.

"It's confusing, because you go to a church, and you think it's part of your family," Gee said. "But the real estate is owned by somebody else altogether."