ASHTABULA, Ohio — It felt like "calling hours" before a funeral. Hundreds of people passed through St. Joseph Church along Lake Avenue in Ashtabula to say goodbye to the church building ahead of its final mass Thursday evening.
Jerry Zaback, a retired funeral director, flew up from Florida specifically to attend the final mass inside this 120-year-old church.
"It was part of my life," he said. "It's not a church, it's not a building, it's a lifestyle."
News 5 first reported on the closure announcement back in October, as one of several buildings set to close in the Diocese of Youngstown.
Watch that story here:
RELATED: Historic Catholic churches in Ashtabula and Portage counties to close permanently
Back in 2011, St. Joseph and Mother of Sorrows combined with Our Lady of Peace Parish, all within two miles of each other.
"There were times within some of our parishioners' lifetimes when we had these three buildings going and we had full Sundays all three and lots of people," Fr. Connor Hetzel of Our Lady of Peace Parish said. "That's not the case anymore. Unfortunately, we've had to make these hard decisions of what can we do to be responsible."
As News 5 previously reported, the closures are part of the diocese's ongoing Diocesan Pastoral Plan, which was originally developed in 2019 to address changing demographics and maintain focus on ministry despite operational challenges.
St. Joseph is not the only Catholic church in Ashtabula facing closure. Mother of Sorrows faced the same fate, but parishioners there made a formal appeal to the Vatican to keep it open. That appeal is still being reviewed.
Among those who came to say goodbye to St. Joseph was 93-year-old Dolly Kirk.
"I wasn't surprised, it's been coming on and I'm very unhappy about it," Kirk said. "We only have the one church. It's not as beautiful of a church as these ones are. I like old churches."
"When you walk in a church like this, the high vaulted ceilings, all the grandeur, you feel the reverence for the mass when you come to a building like this," Celeste Fenton, who went to school here and drove up from Pierpont, said.
As for what comes next for the St. Joseph building?
"[It's] yet to be finally decided but there are two options: it can be knocked down or it can be sold," Hetzel told News 5.
If it is sold to an organization not associated with the Catholic Church, Fr. Hetzel said the building would need to be stripped of all its religious artifacts.
"If it's sold to anybody else, a lot of this beautiful stuff unfortunately has to be moved," he said.
Fr. Hetzel added that they are looking at ways to repurpose or reuse as many of the artifacts at St. Joseph as they can.
A livestream of the 6:30 p.m. final mass at St. Joseph is set to be available on the Our Lady of Peace Parish Facebook page.
Clay LePard is the Ashtabula, Geauga and Portage counties reporter at News 5 Cleveland. Follow him on X @ClayLePard, on Facebook ClayLePardTV or email him at Clay.LePard@wews.com.
