Less than nine hours after the end of Easter Sunday, Louisville was rocked by a mass shooting at a downtown bank, killing five persons and the shooter, critically injuring two others including a policeman, and injuring several more. An hour after this shooting, another incident involving a death and an injury happened less than two miles away. Gun violence is sweeping the nation, and now is uncomfortably close to home.
Even before these incidents, our Pastoral Council had the topic of security on our agenda for the April meeting held last Tuesday, April 11. Over the past two years, as we emerged from pandemic restrictions, we have noticed an increase in uncomfortable and hostile situations involving presumably mentally ill persons disturbing worship services and music practices at our churches, as well as disturbing our rectories. After installing video cameras on both campuses, we have been able to capture trespassing and loitering on our parish grounds, but we have been unsuccessful in deterring the behavior. Recently a funeral was disrupted by an argumentative mentally ill person who wandered into the church and sat behind the grieving family.
Most churches, including Catholic parishes, in our area have adopted more stringent security precautions than we have. It is time for us to do the same. On Easter Sunday, we paid for a security professional to be present at two liturgies at St. James. We asked him to examine both campuses for vulnerabilities. We have made the decision to permanently keep the Edenside entrance to St. James locked and to lock the sacristy side entrance at St. James at the beginning of any liturgy. The front entrances at both Saint Brigid and Saint James will be locked from the inside ten minutes after the beginning of liturgy, and one of our greeters will be stationed to admit latecomers and to contact law enforcement if a troublesome person appears outside our doors. Any door locked from the inside can be easily opened by someone seeking to go outside. We are following all fire safety codes with these changes.
This is a first step and will be followed by additional enhancements. We will evaluate how these steps are working and will welcome comments and suggestions from anyone. Our priority is to keep our churches as welcoming as possible, while also making them safer than they are. We plan to begin locking the doors next weekend.
Let us continue to pray for peace and healing in our community and our country. Fr. Gary
