Churches fight to stay open as attendance dwindles

(NEW YORK) -- During the final Mass at the All Saints Parish in Buffalo, New York, on a warm Sunday in July, the priests encouraged the few parishioners who came to take comfort in holy scripture.

"For everything, there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven," the passage read.

On Earth, many parishes are accepting that it's time to sell their properties. As the person leading renewal and development for the Diocese of Buffalo, Father Bryan Zielenieski is one of many religious leaders across America who have closed houses of worship in recent years.

"We essentially went to half of what we used to back in the early 2000s," he told ABC News. "We lost about 100 parishes."

Zielenieski expects he'll need to shut down another 70 churches in what the Diocese is calling its "road to renewal." It's a very biblical name for the challenge facing churches: People just aren't going as much as they used to.

On average, more than half of the diocese's churches today are baptizing fewer than one person a month, and 59% of them are spending more than they take in, Zielenieski noted.

"It's my job and role to not just pray about the situation, but to then look at the hard data and say, where does the church need to move?" he told ABC News.

In the late 1940s, nearly 80% of Americans said they belonged to a church, synagogue, mosque or temple, according to Gallup. Today, just 45% say the same, the analytics company noted, and only 32% say that they worship God in a house of prayer once a week.

In 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic, America was losing as many as 1,000 churches a year.

Some former churches are being converted for businesses or residential use. One old Methodist church in Atlanta, which was down to about 60 members when it closed, was sold to a luxury real estate developer seven years ago. Now, it's become a series of 3,000-square-foot condos.

Some of the oldest churches in the world have even turned into bars and nightclubs.

However, another Atlanta church is taking a different route. Pastor Jasmine Smothers is saving the city's First United Methodist church from closing with what she says is a "God-sized" plan.

The most profitable thing they own is their land, and she's using it to build more than 300 apartments in the high-rent city -- most of which will become affordable housing.

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"It's literally going to change the landscape of Atlanta in more ways than one," she told ABC News.

Smothers said the project will give the church the resources to help people and to continue its ministries.

"In the words of one of my friends, this ain't your great grandma's church," she said.

At Calcium Church outside Syracuse, New York, Pastor Milton LaSalle recently acknowledged to his small-town church that, after 171 years, they're in financial trouble. On a good Sunday, LaSalle has 35 regular members -- most of them are in the sunset of their lives. The church hasn't been forced to close or sell it's land, the pastor says.

"The aging of the church here, of course, is seen all over America. That makes it harder in a lot of ways. For instance, we lost five of our members last year to death," he told ABC News.

LaSalle said he's confident Calcium Church will be able to stay open, but noted that they've had to make cutbacks.

They still hold clothing and school supply giveaways, parishioners told ABC News. Parishioner Jeannetta LaSalle expressed the importance of the church in her life, saying that her fellow churchgoers are like family.

"It gives me purpose to get up in the morning," she told ABC News.

In Buffalo, Father Zielenieski also noted how people turn to the church for comfort in times of crisis, like in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

"There's a sociological principle or idea out there that when times are good, people forget God," he said. "When times are challenging, they go to God first."

However, Zielenieski highlights the danger of taking the church for granted.

"We've never asked the question, how is it going to be there and how is that going to stay?" he said.

The sale of the All Saints Church in Buffalo will close in the coming weeks. The priests told ABC News they have language in the deal that prevents the new owners from turning it into a place that encourages people to sin.

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