Showing posts with label The Church of the Most Holy Redeemer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Church of the Most Holy Redeemer. Show all posts

Thursday, February 8, 2024

An evening of classical music at the Church of the Most Holy Redeemer

On Saturday (Feb. 10), the Most Holy Redeemer/Nativity Parish on Third Street hosts another evening of free music. 

Per the EVG inbox: 
Join us for a relaxing, family-friendly evening of classical cello, piano and vocal music at Most Holy Redeemer Church! 

Reverberant acoustics, a beautiful space, and your favorite masterworks by J.S. Bach, Claude Debussy, Gabriel Faure, Manuel De Falla, and more make for an unforgettable evening. 
The event, free and open to the public, starts at 7:30 p.m. at the church, 173 E. Third St. between Avenue A and Avenue B. Find more details here.

Thursday, September 14, 2023

For the Byrd: Celebrating the music of William Byrd at Most Holy Redeemer

On Saturday evening, the Most Holy Redeemer/Nativity Parish on Third Street is hosting a Byrd Fest. 

The church is celebrating the music of English organist and composer William Byrd (who was NOT a founding member of the Byrds), in the 400th anniversary year of his death featuring faculty members from Juilliard 

The event, free and open to the public, starts at 7 p.m. at the church, 173 E. Third St. between Avenue A and Avenue B. There are post-concert refreshments in the rectory garden. 

Find more details here.

Thursday, June 9, 2022

A benefit concert for Ukraine at the Church of the Most Holy Redeemer

The Most Holy Redeemer/Nativity Parish on Third Street is hosting a benefit concert for Ukraine on Saturday. 

Details via the invite:
Please join us for an evening of classical music to support an important cause! This concert will include works by Ukrainian classical composers Mykola Lysenko and Myroslav Skoryk, plus others. Performers will include opera singer Elena Heimur, violinist Lea Lang, the choir of St. George's Ukrainian Catholic church, and pianist Clara Bartz. 
Free admission; suggested donation $25. All proceeds go to Catholic Near East Welfare Association (CNEWA). Donations may be made in-person at the event...
The concert starts at 7 p.m. at the church, 173 E. Third St. between Avenue A and Avenue B. 

Find more details here.

Monday, May 2, 2022

An evening of chamber music at the Church of the Most Holy Redeemer

Readers have told us they've enjoyed the free concerts at the Most Holy Redeemer/Nativity Parish on Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B. 

So here's another one to mention: This Wednesday at 7, the church is hosting an evening of chamber music featuring a Juilliard faculty husband-and-wife duo performing lute songs from the Renaissance. The show starts at 7 p.m. Find the event link here.

Sunday, April 3, 2022

A springtime choral concert at the Church of the Most Holy Redeemer

The Most Holy Redeemer/Nativity Parish on Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B is hosting an evening of choral and violin music tomorrow (Monday!) night. The event takes place from 7-8:30 p.m. The concert is free. Find more info here.

Saturday, December 18, 2021

A holiday concert at the Church of the Most Holy Redeemer

Photo this month by Stacie Joy 

The Church of the Most Holy Redeemer celebrates the season with a candlelit carol concert tomorrow (Sunday!) afternoon at 4. The event is free (you can register here). 

Proof of vaccination is required, and attendees must wear a mask. Organizers say that there will be enough room in the church for people to remain socially distant.

Sunday, December 5, 2021

A celebration of Our Lady of Guadalupe on 3rd Street

You may have noticed the colorful procession yesterday outside the Most Holy Redeemer/Nativity Parish on Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B.

It was a celebration of Our Lady of Guadalupe, also known as the Virgin of Guadalupe. (This was a prelude to the official Feast Day on Dec. 12.)

As NBC News reported back in 2019:
For Mexicans and Mexican-Americans as well as other Latinos, Our Lady of Guadalupe is a powerful symbol of devotion, identity, and patriotism. Her image inspires artists, activists, feminists and the faithful.

EVG contributor Stacie Joy shared these photos from the celebration... 

Monday, October 18, 2021

You had me at cello: Details on a free recital tomorrow evening at Most Holy Redeemer

Passing this along from the folks at Most Holy Redeemer/Nativity Parish on Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B... 

Tomorrow night, there's a cello and piano recital from 7:30-8:30 ... featuring Roric Cunningham, currently a student at Juilliard, and Clara Bartz, who serves as the church's director of music...
Tickets are free, and you can sign up for them here.

Thursday, March 18, 2021

Free groceries and milk tomorrow at the Most Holy Redeemer Nativity Church

The folks at the Most Holy Redeemer Nativity Church on Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B shared this information about a free food and milk pantry tomorrow (March 19) from 10 a.m. to noon ...
Three trucks will provide FREE a grocery box, a produce box and the third truck will provide a gallon of fortifying milk. Distribution will be in front of Most Holy Redeemer Church ... on a first come, first served basis, while supplies last. No pre-registration is required. 
Please observe social distancing and wear a face covering. We're looking forward to seeing our neighbors!

Thursday, August 6, 2020

A pop-up food pantry at the Most Holy Redeemer Church on Friday



The folks at the Most Holy Redeemer Church on Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B shared this information about a free food and milk pantry tomorrow (Aug. 7)...

In collaboration with our friends at Catholic Charities of New York, we have arranged for some much-needed relief for our community! One truck will provide FREE nutritious groceries and the other truck will provide fortifying milk.

The distribution will be in front of Most Holy Redeemer Church, 173 E. 3rd St, August 7, from 10 a.m. - noon, and is on a first-come, first-served basis, while supplies last. No pre-registration is required. Please observe social distancing and wear a face covering.

We're looking forward to seeing our neighbors!

Wednesday, December 4, 2019

A high mass in honor of St. Nicholas



Here's an invitation via the staff at the Most Holy Redeemer & Nativity Church:

Historic Most Holy Redeemer and Nativity Church will celebrate its origins in the German immigrant community with a special mass in honor of St. Nicholas.

It will be a traditional Latin Solemn High Mass including Gregorian Chant propers and featuring Hayden’s Nikolaimesse (St. Nicholas Mass), under the direction of James Wetzel, director of music at the Church of Saint Vincent Ferrer. The mass starts 6 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 5.

The church, which was completed and consecrated in 1852, is located on Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B. The mass will be followed by a reception with "seasonal refreshments" (egg nog?).


[Church interior via Stacie Joy]

Friday, April 19, 2019

Good Friday 2019: Jesus walks, falls on 3rd Street



Once again on this Good Friday, parishioners from several churches in the neighborhood — Most Holy Redeemer, Our Lady of Sorrows and St. Mary's Grand — took part in the Stations of the Cross.

EVG contributor Stacie Joy shared these photos from along Third Street...































... and a look inside the Church of the Most Holy Redeemer on Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B... where the procession wound up...

Tuesday, April 9, 2019

Report: Archdiocese of New York announces affordable-housing projects; fate of 2 East Village churches unknown


[EVG photo of Church of the Nativity from March 16]

Catholic Homes New York, the affordable housing unit of Catholic Charities and the Archdiocese of New York, announced plans yesterday to redevelop several existing properties to provide 2,000 affordable units in NYC over the next 10 years.

Not on the affordable-housing list for now, as Gothamist first noted, are the now-closed Church of the Nativity on Second Avenue between Second Street and Third Street, and the Church of Saint Emeric on 13th Street near Avenue D.

The Cooper Square Community Land Trust has been actively trying to buy and develop these two properties for use as low-income housing.

Monsignor Kevin Sullivan, the executive director of Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of New York, said that he was not aware of the plans for these two East Village parcels.

Per Gothamist yesterday:

"While we commend the church for the good they are doing, we remain opposed to the church disposing of properties in gentrifying neighborhoods that are in danger of luxury condo development," said Val Orselli, a project director with Cooper Square Community Land Trust. "The church has not merely an obligation to do good but it also has an obligation not to do harm."

As Curbed reported in February, the Archdiocese of New York was said to be considering a proposal to turn the 300,000-square-foot property that housed Saint Emeric on 13th Street, which includes a former school, over to a land trust for 400 units of below-market-rate housing.

The Cooper Square Community Land Trust is expected to host a town hall next month with Community Board 3 to discuss "how decommissioned churches can be best utilized by the Archdiocese and the communities they once served."

Previously on EV Grieve:
Looking at the Church of Saint Emeric on East 13th Street

From St. Emeric's to St. Brigid's

Educator: Turning the former Church of the Nativity into luxury housing would be a 'sordid use' of the property

The fight to keep Church of the Nativity from becoming luxury housing

Sunday, March 17, 2019

The fight to keep Church of the Nativity from becoming luxury housing


[Photo from yesterday]

ICYMI from Thursday ... Elizabeth Kim at Gothamist has a feature on the Cooper Square Community Land Trust's efforts to buy the Church of the Nativity on Second Avenue for use as low-income housing.

An excerpt:

The land trust proposed a price of $18.5 million. Of that amount, $5 million would be paid to the archdiocese upon closing. The remainder, which would use a combination of federal tax credits and state and local funding, would be paid in installments over a 20-year period.

David Brown, the church’s director of real estate, told Val Orselli [a project director with Cooper Square Community Land Trust] he would get back to him.

Several months later, Orselli returned to Brown's office. In a show of support, representatives of city councilmembers Carlina Rivera and Margaret Chin, as well as the Manhattan regional representative from Governor Andrew Cuomo’s office, accompanied him.

But Brown was unmoved. The offer was insufficient, he told them. Among the sticking points was the land trust’s inability to pay upfront.

“He told me, ‘A dollar today is worth more than a dollar tomorrow,'” Orselli recalled.

Orselli took the rejection as a sign that the church, a tax-exempt institution, was more interested in getting top dollar for its property, which has been estimated as being worth as much as $50 million.

“I was a bit naive,” he said. Referring to the land trust’s pitch to do something with the property that was aligned with papal doctrines, he added, “They couldn’t care less.”

The Church closed after a service on July 31, 2015, merging with Most Holy Redeemer on Third Street. In the summer of 2017, the archdiocese desacralized the former church, clearing the way for a potential sale of the desirable property.

The Cooper Square Community Land Trust is currently organizing a town hall this May with Community Board 3 to discuss "how decommissioned churches can be best utilized by the Archdiocese and the communities they once served." Something other than demolishing them to make way for ultra-luxury condos.


Meanwhile, as Curbed reported in February, the Archdiocese of New York is considering a proposal to turn the 300,000-square-foot property that housed Saint Emeric on 13th Street, which includes a former school, over to a land trust for 400 units of below-market-rate housing.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Looking at the Church of Saint Emeric on East 13th Street

From St. Emeric's to St. Brigid's

Educator: Turning the former Church of the Nativity into luxury housing would be a 'sordid use' of the property

Wednesday, December 5, 2018

Educator: Turning the former Church of the Nativity into luxury housing would be a 'sordid use' of the property


[EVG file photo]

I haven't heard anything the former Church of the Nativity on Second Avenue in almost a year to the date.

On Dec. 2, 2017, Friends of Nativity Church and the Cooper Square Community Land Trust held a prayer service and advocated that the property be used for low-incoming housing.

First, some background before getting to the point of bringing this up now.

The church closed in July 2015 as part of a massive consolidation reportedly due to changing demographics and a shortage of priests available to say mass. The Church of the Nativity merged with the Church of the Most Holy Redeemer on Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B.

The Friends of Nativity had previously proposed a Dorothy Day Shrine and retreat center with services for the homeless at 44 Second Ave. between Second Street and Third Street. (Read more about that proposal here.)

This past summer, the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York desacralized the former church, clearing the way for a potential sale of the desirable property.

Last Thursday, Rebecca Amato, a professor at NYU and associate director of the school's Urban Democracy Lab, presented on the Church of the Nativity at the Pontifical Council for Culture’s international conference on cultural heritage in Rome. The topic of the conference, "Doesn’t God Dwell Here Anymore?," facilitated discussion about reusing church landholdings after they are decommissioned.

According to her presentation, the Archdiocese of New York has sold at least 19 sacred properties for luxury development since 1996. (Hello Steiner East Village!)

In an interview with the National Catholic Reporter published Monday, Amato makes her case for using the site for the needy. (H/T to The Lo-Down who linked to this article yesterday.)

An excerpt from the article:

Amato ... said former parishioners proposed to purchase the decommissioned church for $18 million to develop low-income, senior and homeless family housing.

The alternative plan is to sell the property for a reported $50 million and build a luxury residential development, which Amato said would be a "sordid use" of a once-sacred edifice.

Although not all of the residents in the area were parishioners, decommissioned churches like the Church of the Nativity continue to be an integral part of "the fabric of a neighborhood," Amato said.

"Those are the kind of things that are destroyed by global investment firms, but they shouldn't be destroyed by the archdiocese; they shouldn't be behaving the same way," Amato said.

The proposal to convert the parish into low-income housing would greatly benefit the residents near the church, Amato said. Predominantly made up of Catholics of Puerto Rican descent, residents find themselves not only "displaced by housing issues, evictions, rising land costs but now they're being displaced by their own Catholic Church, by the archdiocese."

"So, the idea of selling this property — that is so associated with the Catholic Worker [Movement] and advocacy for the poor — for $50 million is astounding on so many levels."

And the Archdiocese's take:

Joseph Zwilling, communications director for the New York Archdiocese, acknowledged that several proposals for the site were reviewed, including the proposal submitted by the church's former parishioners.

Nevertheless, he said, "the parish needs to receive fair market value for the property so that the parish and the archdiocese can continue to meet the pastoral, charitable, educational — and housing — needs of the people we serve."

Zwilling also explained that the proposed sale of the property "is by and for the parish, not the archdiocese."

He also said that proceeds from the sale of the Church of the Nativity, which was merged in 2015 with a neighboring parish — Most Holy Redeemer — would not go to the archdiocese, but the parish.

You can read another interview with Amato along with more background in this article at America Magazine.

Not mentioned in this articles: This past July, Provincial Superior Father Paul Borowski announced during a mass at the Most Holy Redeemer that the Redemptorists would be turning the parish back to the archdiocese in the summer of 2019. (Among other reasons, he cited older and fewer priests.) As I understand it, the church, which was completed in 1852, will be administered by a Diocesan priest starting next summer.

Previously on EV Grieve:
As the Church of the Nativity closes for good tonight, take a look at the original structure

Parishioners fight to save the Church of the Nativity on 2nd Avenue

Parishioners hope their prayers are answered with former Nativity space on 2nd Avenue

Tuesday, October 25, 2016

3 new name possibilities for Church of Most Holy Redeemer and Nativity on 3rd Street


[EVG photo from the summer]

Last week we noted that there's a movement afoot to change the name of the Roman Catholic Church of Most Holy Redeemer and Nativity on East Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B. (The Church of the Nativity on Second Avenue merged with Most Holy Redeemer in July 2015.)

Father Sean McGillicuddy solicited suggestions for the new name via the church bulletin.

The three top proposals are:

• Most Holy Redeemer and Nativity Church

• The Nativity of Most Holy Redeemer

• Saint John XXIII Church

According to an EVG reader and parishioner, ballots will be given out at every mass next weekend and the results will be given to Cardinal Dolan.

Possible new name aside, the neighbor told us previously that several of Father McGillicuddy's initiatives have been perceived as "ruinous" by some of the parishioners, who don't feel comfortable speaking out about the changes.

Wednesday, October 19, 2016

A name change suggested for Church of the Most Holy Redeemer on 3rd Street



In July 2015, the Church of the Nativity on Second Avenue between Third Street and Second Street shut its doors, part of a consolidation by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York ... the parish consolidated with the Church of the Most Holy Redeemer on Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B.



Now there is a movement afoot via the pastor to change the name of the historic church, which was consecrated in November 1852.

The following message is from the church's bulletin from Sunday...



It reads:

We are now a new parish in the eyes of the Church and the civil government. Our official name is The Roman Catholic Church of Most Holy Redeemer and Nativity. However, we can opt to change our name. It can be something totally different — for example — St. John Paul II, St. Theresa of Calcutta, etc. If you have any suggestions, please put your suggestion and why you want this name in writing, and leave it at the office for Fr. Sean McGillicuddy before, Friday, October 21.

One neighbor and parishioner opposed to a random name change explained in an email:

"A modification of the name could imperil and erode its long-standing identity and history ... it is a cherished institution that has no reason to be known as anything other than Most Holy Redeemer."

Possible new name aside, the neighbor said that several of Father McGillicuddy's initiatives have been perceived as "ruinous" by some of the parishioners, who don't feel comfortable speaking out about the changes.

"He never consulted the parish or its council on matters that affect the interior or architectural cosmetics of the church — such as the four statues of Mary now inserted in the churches facade, for example. The interior is being desecrated: florescent spot lights at the shrines, thrift shop prayer stools and electric candle alters cluttering the alters. And he is having the larger-than-life hand-carved wooden statues (works of masterful European craftsmanship) painted over with metallic paint. What were once works of art now look like cheap trinkets and chachkas.

And...

"The church ... belongs to history, the community... the Lower East Side."

Friday, April 29, 2016

There's something about Mary



Yesterday, an EVG reader noted the arrival of three statues of the Virgin Mary in the previously empty spaces outside Most Holy Redeemer-Nativity Church on East Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B.

EVG reader David sent these shots today...







Per David: "All three are the same — very worn-down-looking statues of Mary, but each has a very different surface. Is that supposed to look like marble? Quite surreal! I kind of like them..."

Saturday, March 12, 2016

A reminder about Daylight Saving Time

Just a reminder (cut and paste from the Google):

Daylight Saving Time (United States) 2016 begins at 2:00 AM on Sunday, March 13

...and ends at 2:00 AM on Sunday, November 6

So, if you're looking at The Church of the Most Holy Redeemer on East Third Street ... it will actually be 6:15 rather than 5:15... or 2:40 instead of 1:40...

Tuesday, February 3, 2015

A sign from...?



EVG reader Rik Rocket notes an upward pointing icicle stalactite on the cross at The Church of the Most Holy Redeemer on East Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B... it's a sign, right?