The Province of St. Mary is withdrawing from Holy Cross-St. John the Baptist Parish in midtown Manhattan effective June 30, 2026, ending 174 years of the Capuchin presence in the heart of New York City. The Capuchins have served collectively at St. John since 1870 and at Holy Cross since 2013.
St. John the Baptist was the second foundation of the Capuchins in the eastern United States. (Our Lady of Sorrows Parish and Friary was established in Manhattan’s Lower East Side in 1867.) In its early years it supported German immigrants who worked in the Garment District of midtown Manhattan. Under the pastor Br. Bonaventure Frey, the people built the present-day church, designed in the Gothic style by architect Napoleon LeBrun, on West 30th Street. With the opening of New York’s Penn Station in 1910, the church, located one block south of the train terminal, evolved into a spiritual haven for commuters seeking grace and peace in the midst of the bustling, sometimes merciless city.
The church founded three fraternities of Secular Franciscans that provided spiritual nourishment to thousands of Catholics, as well as numerous other societies and organizations. It responded to the rise in poverty, homelessness, and drug addiction in the neighborhood in the latter 20th century with the founding of its Bread of Life food pantry, 12-step programs, and other social services. Even as the number of parishioners fell sharply with economic and demographic changes, a variety of new evangelization efforts sprang up, including the all-night vigil to Our Lady of Fatima, a young adult ministry, a charismatic prayer group, and many other devotional groups. Under pastor Br. Francis Gasparik, the church undertook major renovations in the 1990s, saving the parish from closure. After the canonization of Padre Pio in 2002, the friars obtained first-class relics that they installed in a permanent shrine in the east wall of the church. The church has celebrated a weekly novena Mass in honor of St. Pio ever since, as well as a festive Mass and neighborhood procession on his feast day.
The Archdiocese of New York merged St. John the Baptist Church with Holy Cross Church on West 42nd Street in 2015, further extending the mission of the Capuchins to show forth “Christ in the City.”
On Friday, June 26, the friars celebrated a Mass of thanksgiving with the people of the parish at the Church of St. John the Baptist. A celebration followed in the church hall. Click here for photos of the farewell.
Br. Will Tarraza, a member of the provincial council, read a letter from Br. James Peterson, provincial minister. Here is the statement:
Brothers and sisters in Christ,
I address you on this unfortunate occasion of farewell to the Capuchin Franciscans of the Province of St. Mary as we must withdraw our presence from the Parish of Holy Cross-St. John the Baptist. I apologize that as provincial minister I cannot personally be present to offer these words, as I am currently finishing my ministerial commitment in the Diocese of Portland, Me. However, I trust our brothers who have served you diligently and our provincial council members who are present will express my gratitude for your support for us and my concern for the good of all. I am especially grateful to Br. Michael Ramos for his tremendous care of your spiritual needs in these last few weeks.
There are many factors that went into our decision to withdraw from your parish, none of which might adequately satisfy your disappointment. One of the most evident challenges we face as a Church is the shortage of priestly and religious vocations, especially in northeastern part of the United States. This challenge has given us opportunities as Capuchins to reflect upon and renew our way of life that will inspire young men to live the Gospel in the spirit of St. Francis as a Capuchin. However, it has also demanded that we make difficult choices in the ministerial commitments we have as a Province. My first encouragement is to pray for strong vocations! We need young men to generously respond to God’s call, but we also need people to pray for these individuals to have the courage and be encouraged to do so!
Farewells are never easy, especially when the reasons don’t seem fair. We have left several parish communities over the last decades, and none have made this any easier, not only for the parishioners, but also for the friars who served so diligently those communities. Relationships have developed and bonds have been rooted in the love and mercy of Christ that will never be broken. Despite this challenge, I hope you will hear my sending-forth encouragement for you all: please don’t let our departure diminish your faith in Jesus Christ. Our prayer as a Province is that our legacy, that is, the Capuchin spirit, will remain in the hearts of all who have been touched by our friars over the many decades we have served here. People come into our lives for a season and they move on, but Jesus must remain the purpose for everything we do as Christians. We all are flawed, but the hope is that we all make decisions as a response of love and not fear or anger. Yet most importantly, we are all on a pilgrimage of life, journeying back to the one who gave us life in the first place. Let us turn to Christ when we find the path difficult or confusing. The Gospel cannot be silenced despite the various challenges we face as a Church. We are incredibly grateful for the love and commitment you have shown us over the many years we have been here. We join you in continued prayer as we continue to be faithful to the God who is always faithful to us. Please know of all our prayers for you.
Respectfully yours in Christ,
Br. James Peterson, Provincial Minister
During the reception after the liturgy, Br. James Donegan, another member of the provincial council, offered this tribute to the parish.
Brothers and sisters,
It is with both gratitude and sadness that we reach this point today: gratitude for the many years that have been a grace for both us as Capuchin friars and for you as the community here in this part of New York City. It was 174 years ago, in 1852, that Br. Augustine Dantner became the first Capuchin to serve as pastor here, and in 1870, that Archbishop John Cardinal McCloskey asked our friars to formally take up the pastoral care of St. John the Baptist Parish from that point forward.
That was at a time before the construction of the original train depot of the Pennsylvania Railroad, and in which most of the parishioners here were German immigrants. Little did anyone have any inkling of the many changes that would take place here over the years, the many friars who would live here, the many ways in which the people of this parish would express their Catholic faith here.
We give thanks to God for all those opportunities we have had as Capuchin friars to live and serve in this community over the years. We give thanks to God for our brother +Br. Armand Dasseville: in his many years of assistance to the Secular Franciscan Order; in the all-night vigils he initiated, going back to 1969; and the promotion of the devotion to Padre Pio, as national coordinator of the Padre Pio Prayer Groups and in bringing the relics of Padre Pio here to New York City. We give thanks to God for +Br. Luke Benbrook, who for over 30 years served here as porter, sacristan, and sexton. We give thanks to God for +Br. Sal Patricola, who for two decades was often the first friar people would see when arriving here, compared by one parishioner to Blessed Solanus Casey as “a greeter, a listener, a confidant.”
We give thanks to God for all our friars, both living and deceased, who have served as pastors here. The list would become too long to name them all, going back to Br. Augustine Dantner and Br. Bonaventure Frey, who was the first pastor here after the care of the parish was given to the friars as a collective in 1870. But to name a few: +Br. Francis Gasparik, Br. Bernard Maloney, +Br. Phillip Fabiano, Br. Thomas Franks, and, of course, Br. Michael Ramos.
We give thanks to God for the encounters that we have been able to have for over a century and a half with you and with the parishioners here who came before you. We give thanks for your participation with us in our life and charism, just as we have had the opportunity to be a part of your lives. We ask that you continue to pray for us, for those discerning the possibility of becoming friars themselves, and to keep the devotion to the Capuchin saints and blessed alive. We hope as well to continue with a shrine at another one of our Capuchin presences, including with the relics.
We friars all made a vow, one that, as vows are, is always easier to say than to live: that of a life sine proprio, that is, without anything of our own. At the heart of this vow is a recognition that everything is purely a gift from God, that nothing is ours on our own accord, nor can we try to maintain a grapple on that which is God’s grace. We give thanks to God for all that we have been able to share here, because we have come ourselves as guests to be heralds of the Good News. And so as we depart from this place, we must recognize that as we let go, we do not go away empty-hearted. May we carry the grace that we have been able to experience together in this place in our hearts for years to come.
Pax et bonum!
