The Archdiocese of New York is threatening to close down my little church, a jewel in Catholicismâ??s crown on 89th Street just off Madison, in Carnegie Hill, on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. This has caused great pain in our neighborhood this Christmas. St. Thomas More Church is where my son made his first holy communion, where he was confirmed. It is where at the presentation of the cross, on Good Friday, everyone in the parish who wants toâ??and that is everyone in the parish, poor people, crazy people, people just holding on, housekeepers, shopkeepers, billionairesâ??stands on line together, as equals, as brothers and sisters, to kiss the foot of the cross. It always makes me cry.
None of this is important except multiply it by 5,000, 10,000, a million people whoâ??ve walked through our doors the past 75 years to marry, to bury, to worship.
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