Dan Syracuse figured it made sense to become a member of the Catholic church where his two kids are enrolled in the parish school. But when he inquired about signing up, the Cheektowaga resident said, he and his family were turned down for membership at Queen of Heaven Catholic Church in West Seneca by the pastor, the Rev. Thomas Quinlivan.
“He said, ‘I can’t let you join,’ ” according to Syracuse, who was attempting to move from Resurrection Church in Cheektowaga, where he had been a member since 2001. “Where’s the Christian attitude in that?”
Quinlivan said he’s simply trying to keep his school stable and strong in an era of tremendous financial challenges facing Catholic education.
The policy allows Queen of Heaven Parish to collect a subsidy from a Catholic Diocese of Buffalo education fund established in 2007.
The subsidy amounts to about $1,000 per nonparishioner student. About 80 Queen of Heaven students — a quarter of the student body — come from other parishes, and their families are welcome to worship at Queen of Heaven, Quinlivan said.
“It’s not really a question of people being denied,” he said. “It’s actually to their benefit that we have the policy we do. When they become parishioners, we’re not able to get that money. We’re trying to keep tuition down.”
The diocesan aid amounts to about $80,000 — a “significant part of our budgeting,” said Quinlivan. “We’re trying to remain open for the community, and the diocese has funds to help us with that.”
Besides, the parish has had a policy of not granting membership to Catholic families from other parishes that enroll their children in the school, he said, since before Quinlivan became pastor in 1987.
“That’s nothing new. They know that when they come here,” said Quinlivan. “Our policy has been clear from the beginning. The policy has been that we have the school and that those coming from other parishes to our school, that we’re not able to register them as parishioners.”
But Syracuse and other parents said the policy makes no sense, particularly in an era of school closings.
If Resurrection School hadn’t closed in 2007, Syracuse and his family would have chosen to stay in the parish.
“We didn’t ask them to close six schools in a 10-mile radius,” he said.
Now, he said, he and his wife have to work functions at Resurrection and Queen of Heaven churches to satisfy obligations for both parishes. Without doing the volunteer work, a requirement of most Catholic schools, they would have to pay an additional $300 per student, per year.
“We don’t have a problem helping the school out,” said Syracuse. “I’m thinking you don’t want me to be part of your parish, but you want me to raise money for your parish.”
Syracuse isn’t alone. Two other parents with children in Queen of Heaven School said they asked to join the parish and were denied.
Marilyn Harding, of West Seneca, said she pulled her daughter out of Queen of Heaven School at the end of the last school year, after being told that she and her family could not join the parish.
“ ‘Oh, it’s not possible,’ he told me,” said Harding. “He wants to keep his parish strong. He wants to keep his money.”
Harding said she and her family were welcomed as parishioners at Fourteen Holy Helpers Church, and her daughter now attends classes in the parish school.
The diocese has received telephone calls from parents complaining about the policy at Queen of Heaven.
Diocesan spokesman Kevin A. Keenan said that the policy wasn’t dictated by Bishop Edward U. Kmiec but that parishes have the autonomy to set such regulations.
Quinlivan said he has received one complaint about the policy.
“It’s not really an issue, and to be honest, I think it’s a tempest in a teapot,” he said.
As enrollments decline and education costs continue to grow, parishes increasingly have taken on a heavier burden to sustain their schools.
Some parishes spent as much as three-quarters of their incomes on schools before finally deciding to shut them down.
In 2007, the diocese developed a new plan to help spread the cost of Catholic education across more parishes, including those that don’t run schools.
All parishes without schools are now assessed a diocesan school tax according to their annual collection levels. About two-thirds of that money, an estimated $4 million, is then split among 13 Catholic regional elementary schools.
Queen of Heaven is not considered a regional school, but it is eligible to receive subsidies through the remaining third of the school fund, which allows $1,000 in tuition grants for students who attend a parish school and are members of a parish without a school.
Those grants are supposed to replace any subsidies provided by the pupil’s home parish.
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(Source: CHR)