Cardinal Bevilacqua to close two parish schools - Nation - Philadelphia schools Most Blessed Sacrament, Good Shepherd - Brief Article

National Catholic Reporter, March 8, 2002 by Gill Donovan

Citing declining enrollment, Philadelphia Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua has announced plans to close two parish schools on the city's west side. Most Blessed Sacrament, once the largest Catholic school in the country, and the Good Shepherd school will shut down permanently at the end of the current academic school year in June.

"Sadly, it has become impossible to keep these parish schools open and viable," Bevilacqua said in a Jan. 14 statement.

The closings are the latest in a growing list of schools and churches shut down in the archdiocese since 1994 because of declining numbers (NCR, June 19, 1998).

Sr. Joan Ames, Most Blessed Sacrament's principal, told The Philadelphia Inquirer that learning of the closing was "one of the saddest days of my life," but added, "I can't say I'm surprised."

A 1998 recommendation by a group of priests and laity appointed by the archdiocese recommended that two schools in the area be shut down.

Most Blessed Sacrament, whose enrollment was about 3,800 students per year in the 1960s, has some 170 students this year. In the '60s, Good Shepherd enrolled about 1,200. Now, enrollment is 203 pupils, Fr. Thomas Heron, pastor of Good Shepherd Parish, told The Inquirer. Its student body is racially diverse, he said, including African-American, Vietnamese, Cambodian and white students.