St. Lawrence to cease use as Catholic church

WEST HAVEN — The city’s oldest Catholic church will no longer be sanctified as a Catholic church as of Dec. 27, following a Dec. 5 decree by The Most Rev. Leonard P. Blair, archbishop of Hartford.

It is not a surprise that Saint Lawrence Church, a Main Street fixture built in 1903, will be “relegated to profane but not sordid use” per the decree; the church was listed for sale for $695,000 in February, a little over one year after the church’s pastor announced its closure due to necessary cost-prohibitive construction work on the structure.

A phone call to the Archdiocese of Hartford was not answered Friday, and a phone call to the St. John XXIII Catholic Parish was not returned Thursday.

Per Blair’s decree, altars, sacred objects and religious artifacts will be removed from the building.

The Rev. José Mercado, pastor of St. John XXIII Parish, told parishioners in 2021 that repairs to the church’s severely leaking roof and broken stone and brickwork came with a high price tag. The roof repairs alone were estimated at $327,000. Mercado

said the trustees and the parish council determined that it would not be good fiscal stewardship to invest in the building amid decreasing parish membership.

Although the church will be decommissioned, the St. Lawrence School on the church’s campus will remain operational.

A realtor who listed the church did not respond to requests for comment as to whether the listing is active and whether a sale was made. West Haven City Clerk John Lewis said Tuesday the city has not received any deed paperwork from a sale of the property.