By Naftali
Bendavid
 |
|
The former Roman
Catholic Church of St. Joseph in Arnhem, Netherlands, one of hundreds of
decommissioned churches, was turned into a skate park. Merlijn Doomernik for The Wall
Street Journal
|
Hundreds of churches
have closed or are threatened by plunging membership, posing question: what to
do with unused buildings?
ARNHEM,
Netherlands—Two dozen scruffy skateboarders launched perilous jumps in a
soaring old church building here on a recent night, watched over by a mosaic
likeness of Jesus and a solemn array of stone saints.
This
is the Arnhem Skate Hall, an uneasy reincarnation of the Church of St. Joseph,
which once rang with the prayers of nearly 1,000 worshipers.
It
is one of hundreds of churches, closed or threatened by plunging membership,
that pose a question for communities, and even governments, across Western
Europe: What to do with once-holy, now-empty buildings that increasingly mark
the countryside from Britain to Denmark?
The
Skate Hall may not last long. The once-stately church is streaked with water
damage and badly needs repair; the city sends the skaters tax bills; and the
Roman Catholic Church, which still owns the building, is trying to sell it at a
price they can’t afford.
“We’re
in no-man’s-land,” says Collin Versteegh, the youthful 46-year-old who runs the
operation, rolling cigarettes between denouncing local politicians. “We have no
room to maneuver anywhere.”
The
Skate Hall’s plight is replicated across a continent that long nurtured Christianity
but is becoming relentlessly secular.
The
closing of Europe’s churches reflects the rapid weakening of the faith in
Europe, a phenomenon that is painful to both worshipers and others who see
religion as a unifying factor in a disparate society.
“In
these little towns, you have a cafe, a church and a few houses—and that is the
village,” says Lilian Grootswagers, an activist who fought to save the church
in her Dutch town. “If the church is abandoned, we will have a huge change in
our country.”
Trends
for other religions in Europe haven’t matched those for Christianity. Orthodox
Judaism, which is predominant in Europe, has held relatively steady. Islam,
meanwhile, has grown amid immigration from Muslim countries in Africa and the
Middle East.
The
number of Muslims in Europe grew from about 4.1% of the total European
population in 1990 to about 6% in 2010, and it is projected to reach 8%, or 58
million people, by 2030, according to Washington’s Pew Research Center.
For
Christians, a church’s closure—often the centerpiece of the town square—is an
emotional event. Here people have worshiped, felt grief and joy, and quested
for a relationship with God. Even some secular residents are upset when these
landmarks fall into disuse or are demolished.
When
they close, towns often want to re-create the feeling of a community hub by
finding important uses for these historic buildings. But the properties are
usually expensive to maintain—and there is a limit to the number of libraries
or concert halls a town can financially support. So commercial projects often
take the space.
Europe-wide
numbers of closed churches are scarce, but figures from individual countries
are telling.
The
Church of England closes about 20 churches a year. Roughly 200 Danish churches
have been deemed nonviable or underused. The Roman Catholic Church in Germany
has shut about 515 churches in the past decade.
But
it is in the Netherlands where the trend appears to be most advanced. The
country’s Roman Catholic leaders estimate that two-thirds of their 1,600
churches will be out of commission in a decade, and 700 of Holland’s Protestant
churches are expected to close within four years.
“The
numbers are so huge that the whole society will be confronted with it,” says
Ms. Grootswagers, an activist with Future for Religious Heritage, which works
to preserve churches. “Everyone will be confronted with big empty buildings in
their neighborhoods.”
The
U.S. has avoided a similar wave of church closings for now, because American
Christians remain more religiously observant than Europeans. But religious
researchers say the declining number of American churchgoers suggests the
country could face the same problem in coming years.
Many
European churches have been centerpieces of their communities for centuries.
Residents are often deeply attached to them, fighting pragmatic proposals to
turn them into stores or offices.
Mr.
Versteegh sees the skate hall as a benefit to the town, saying it serves to
protect the building and also gives youngsters a way to enjoy themselves in a
constructive way. But he says local Catholic and city leaders refuse to support
it, he thinks due to its vaguely rebellious aura. “We don’t know which door to
knock on,” he says.
Church
and city leaders deny that, saying they like the Skate Hall but cite its
precarious finances. “Collin wants sweet love. We’re going to give tough love,”
says Gerrie Elfrink, Arnhem’s vice mayor. “He wants the easy way—‘Give me money
and then I’ll have no problems.’ But that’s not sustainable.”
As
communities struggle to reinvent their old churches, some solutions are less
dignified than others. In Holland, one ex-church has become a supermarket,
another is a florist, a third is a bookstore and a fourth is a gym. In Arnhem,
a fashionable store called Humanoid occupies a church building dating to 1889,
with racks of stylish women’s clothing arrayed under stained-glass windows.
In
Bristol, England, the former St. Paul’s church has become the Circomedia circus
training school. Operators say the high ceilings are perfect for aerial
equipment like trapezes.
In
Edinburgh, Scotland, a Lutheran church has become a Frankenstein-themed bar,
featuring bubbling test tubes, lasers and a life-size Frankenstein’s monster
descending from the ceiling at midnight.
Jason
MacDonald, a supervisor at the pub, says he has never heard complaints about
the reuse. “It’s for one simple reason: There are hundreds and hundreds of old
churches and no one to go to them,” Mr. MacDonald said. “If they weren’t
repurposed, they would just lie empty.”
Many
churches, especially smaller ones, are becoming homes, and that has spawned an
entire industry to connect would-be buyers with old churches.
The
churches of England and Scotland list available properties online, with
descriptions worthy of a realty firm. St. John’s church in Bacup, England, for
example, is said to feature “a lofty nave as well as basement rooms with
stone-vaulted ceilings,” and can be had for about $160,000.
The
British website OurProperty is less subtle. “Is modern-day humdrum housing your
idea of a living hell?” it asks. “Is living in a converted church your idea of
heaven above?” If so, “there is a whole congregation of converts and experts
out there ready to help you make the leap of faith.”
Unused
churches are now a big enough problem to attract the attention of governments
as well. The Netherlands, along with religious and civic groups, has adopted a
national “agenda” for preserving the buildings. The Dutch province of
Friesland—where 250 of 720 existing churches have been closed or
transformed—fields a “Delta team” to find solutions.
“Every
church is a debate,” says Albert Reinstra, a church expert at Holland’s
Cultural Heritage Agency. “When they are empty, what do we do with it?”
Preservationists say there often isn’t the money needed to create new
community-oriented uses for the buildings.
That
debate can play out personally and painfully. When Paul Clement, prior of the
Augustinian Order in the Netherlands, joined in 1958, the order had 380 friars;
now it is down to 39. His monastery’s youngest friar is 70, and Father Clement,
himself 74, is developing plans to sell its church.
“It
is difficult,” Father Clement says. “It’s sad for me.”
In
the U.S., church statisticians say roughly 5,000 new churches were added between
2000 and 2010. But some scholars think America’s future will approach Europe’s,
since the number of actual churchgoers fell 3% at the same time, according to
Scott Thumma, professor of the sociology of religion at Connecticut’s Hartford
Seminary.
Mr.
Thumma says America’s churchgoing population is graying. Unless these trends
change, he says, “within another 30 years the situation in the U.S. will be at
least as bad as what is currently evident in Europe.”
At
the Arnhem Skate Hall, the altar and organ of the church, built in 1928, have
been ripped out, while a dusty cupboard still holds sheet music for a choir
that hasn't sung in 10 years. A skateboard attached to a wall urges, “Ride the
dark side.”
Two
dozen young men speed along wooden ramps and quarter-pipes, their falls
thundering through the church, as rap music reverberates where hymns once
sounded. An old tire hangs on the statue of a saint.
Puck
Smit, 21, a regular visitor, says the church ambience enhances the skating
experience. “It creates a lot of atmosphere—it’s a bit of Middle Ages,” he
says, between gulps from a large bottle of cola. “When I first saw it, I just
stood there for five minutes staring.”
Another
regular, Pelle Klomp, 14, says visitors occasionally stop by to complain. “Especially
the older people say, ‘It’s ridiculous, you’re dishonoring faith,’ ” he says.
“And I can understand that. But they weren’t using it.”
Mr.
Versteegh, who oversees the hall, says city and church leaders won’t discuss
their plans with him. The church needs about $3.7 million in maintenance, he
estimates, and would cost $812,000 to buy, including the rectory—far beyond his
resources.
Father
Hans Pauw, pastor of St. Eusebius Parish, confirms the parish is trying to sell
the church, but says church leaders have no problem with skaters using it for
now. He said the parish is talking to a potential buyer.
“There
are some things we don’t want—a casino or a sex palace or that kind of thing,”
Father Pauw says. “But when it’s no longer a church in our eyes, then it can
have any purpose.” As for the painting of Jesus holding a skateboard that now
adorns the interior, he says, “I can see the humor in it.”
Mr.
Elfrink, the Arnhem vice mayor, insists the city has done what it can to
support the Skate Hall, helping fund the wooden skating floor and paying last
year’s tax bill. “I hope it can stay a skate hall,” Mr. Elfrink says.
Mr.
Versteegh sometimes wonders if it will. “Is there any point in continuing to do
this if nobody is supporting you?” he says. “You have a building of
value—historic value, cultural value—that is still owned by the Catholic
Church. But there are no worshipers anymore.”
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