St. Lads parishioners take a stand against a likely sale of their church

St. Ladislaus parishioners participate in a demonstration last Sunday to protest a possible closure of their church.

By Charles Sercombe
Two years ago it was announced that St. Ladislaus Church would be closing.
That turned out to be premature.
But now it appears that day may come. Last Sunday about 40 parishioners demonstrated in front of the church over what might be an impending closing.
Protest organizer Walter Bankowski said the parish council recently voted to close the church. The plan would be for parish to merge with Transfiguration Church in Detroit.
Both churches are part of what’s called the Pope John Paul II Parish. Fr. Andrew Wesley, who is the head of the combined parish, did not return a call for comment.
Bankowski said a decision on whether to close the church will be made by the Detroit Archdiocese in the coming weeks. The parish council vote, he stressed, was only an advisory vote.
Despite that vote, which was a close one, Bankowski said the church is on solid financial ground.
“This is a financially viable church,” he said.
There are about 200 parishioners here.
Bankowski said that St. Lad’s parishioners won’t likely transfer to Transfiguration and instead will go to Queen of Apostles or St. Florian, both of which are in Hamtramck.
That means it’s likely Transfiguration will face being closed in the near future.
The closing of St. Lads would likely lead to the Archdiocese selling the building. The parish previously sold its school building to a charter school. Bankowski said the building sold for $500,000, but none of that money went to the parish.
St. Lads was built in 1952 at a time when Hamtramck’s population was about 50,000. Since then the city’s population has declined to about half that, although in recent years there has been a slight uptick.
But Hamtramck’s newest surge of residents are of the Muslim faith. It is commonly thought that the church would be sold and repurposed into a mosque.