[Episcopal News Service – Philadelphia] By the time St. John’s Episcopal Church in the Philadelphia suburb of Norristown, Pennsylvania, closed in 2015 after 202 years, the parish had around 35 members and was about $260,000 in debt. The cost of maintaining the ornate, neo-Gothic church – the oldest place of worship in the town of about 35,000 – was rising. The church “had a lot more funerals than we had baptisms,” senior warden Bill Kilgour told The Philadelphia Inquirer at the time. “We just didn’t have any young families and children coming up through the ranks.” But what seemed like the end turned out to be the beginning of a new chapter in the church’s life. Since its 2017 revival, the parish has been reborn, with a new community that looks more like the town it serves. In the last 20 years, Norristown’s proportion of Hispanic/Latino residents has jumped from 10% to 27%, many of them from Puebla, Mexico. Pennsylvania Bishop Daniel Gutiérrez recognized that the shifting demographics presented an opportunity to reach new people, and he enlisted the Rev. Andy Kline, who speaks Spanish, to revive St. John’s by getting to know the neighbors and celebrating their culture. Now the church has a thriving 60-member congregation, including 20 families. It hosts a consistent stream of baptisms – at least 11 this year – fiestas and weddings, in addition to regular worship services in English and Spanish. Some of the many baptisms that have taken place at St. John’s under the leadership of the Rev. Andy Kline. Photos: Diocese of Pennsylvania St. John’s is one of three “resurrection churches” – along with St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church and the Church of the Crucifixion, both in Philadelphia – that the Diocese of Pennsylvania has reopened in the last five years by reorienting the churches’ ministry to respond to their communities’ shifting demographics and spiritual and material needs. Buildings that once faced the prospect of sale after their congregations folded now host lively Latino congregations, feeding ministries and outreach to homeless people. The congregations don’t look or sound like they did before, but that’s the point, diocesan leaders say. “The three resurrection churches’ previous iterations … had become completely disconnected from their communities,” the Rev. Kirk Berlenbach, the diocese’s canon for growth and support, told Episcopal News Service. “The core of their [new] identity … is to serve the community.” Upon becoming bishop in 2016, Gutiérrez implemented a strategy of experimentation and adaptation. A relentless optimist who views a closed church not as a permanent end but as an opportunity to repurpose, Gutiérrez told ENS: “If you look at all the successful companies, they don’t replicate what someone else has done; it’s something brand new. And I want us to think that way, like a startup.” Gutiérrez, whose family has roots in what is now New Mexico going back to the 16th century, previously served as canon to the ordinary in the Diocese of the Rio Grande and, before his ordination, as the mayor’s chief of staff and director of economic development in Albuquerque. One of his first actions as bishop was to stop the potential sale of the three historic churches in Philadelphia and Norristown, all of which had stopped having regular worship services between 2013 and 2016. St. John’s was not “actively marketed” for sale because of the continuing homeless ministry there, but the other two were listed for sale. “Selling property is just sort of survival, rather than thriving,” Gutiérrez said. “This diocese is not going to survive; we’re going to thrive.” Diocesan staff and clergy have embraced Gutiérrez’s leadership style, describing the cultural and strategic shift that followed his consecration as “a period of renaissance” after years of normalized decline and turmoil. Gutiérrez’s predecessor, the Rt. Rev. Charles Bennison Jr., clashed with the diocese’s clergy and denominational leadership, particularly regarding his handling of assets and real estate. Bennison closed some 23 “redundant churches” during his 14-year tenure. Since 2000, the practice of closing, merging and selling churches with low Sunday attendance has become common in The Episcopal Church and other Christian denominations. As of 2020, The Episcopal Church has 6,356 churches after hovering around 7,200 for most of the 20th century. The Diocese of Pennsylvania was founded in 1784, though many of its congregations were originally Church of England parishes before the American Revolution, including Christ Church in Philadelphia, which was established in 1695 and a place of worship for some of the Founding Fathers. “This is an old colonial diocese – there’s Episcopal churches within three miles of each other,” Gutiérrez told ENS. “I’d rather have one on every corner.” Down from 193 churches in 1964, the Diocese of Pennsylvania today has 134 churches throughout Philadelphia and four of the surrounding counties. As of December 2020, it had an endowment of $79.8 million. “We’re blessed with a significant endowment in this diocese,” said Berlenbach, canon for growth and support. “But in 20 years, [Gutiérrez] would rather see half the endowment and twice the churches than selling the churches and growing the endowment to service a smaller diocese. He would rather recast those assets to make a difference in our churches so that our churches can make a difference in our communities.” The diocese is not using its endowment to fund the reopenings, according to canon for communications Jennifer Tucker. Each church has its own combination of funding sources. “If we had simply decided to put millions into them, it would not guarantee success,” she told ENS. St. John’s ministry has been funded by the parish endowment and donations as the diocese is “moving them toward self-sufficiency,” Tucker said. The diocese takes care of building expenses since moving its offices to the property, which has “resulted in substantial savings for the diocesan budget,” she said. St. Stephen’s gets funding from its own endowment and rental income, with the diocese paying the vicar’s salary. At the Church of the Crucifixion, … Continue reading Diocese of Pennsylvania reopens 3 churches in 5 years by rediscovering their communities