A Painful Choice Between a Parish and a Church

Under any other circumstance, Eddie Ramirez would be Cardinal Roger M. Mahony’s kind of Roman Catholic.

Since an early age, when he prayed to be cured of tuberculosis, the 71-year-old Ramirez has been a faithful churchgoer who accepts Rome’s authority on matters of faith without question. He’s taught his seven children to accept the Lord and to do His work on Earth. He’s a leader of his local parish as well as being a regular financial contributor.

He refers to Mahony as “our beloved archbishop” and speaks glowingly of the prelate’s ability to speak Spanish and his concern for Latinos.

But these aren’t ordinary times.

Ramirez is boiling mad because the archdiocese wants to turn his neighborhood church in Monterey Park, St. Thomas Aquinas, into an evangelical center aimed at converting the area’s burgeoning Asian population to Catholicism. The only priest who speaks some Spanish at the parish, where 80% of the parishioners are Mexican American, is being transferred after 18 years.

Ramirez, a retired East L.A. pharmacist, accuses the church of pulling a “corporate takeover” in search of wealthy Asians. He accuses the Los Angeles archdiocese of abandoning the faithful Latinos who have been the parish’s pillars for more than 30 years. He accuses Mahony of allowing himself to be maneuvered by subordinates into supporting St. Thomas’ conversion.

“I’m very hurt and angry,” Ramirez says. “My kids had their first Holy Communion in that church. They were confirmed there. Some were married there. The people in the archdiocese didn’t come over and ask us about it. They told us we had to live with it. It was cut and dry.”

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Ramirez isn’t the first Catholic to question church authority. A lot of them have questioned the Vatican on any number of issues--abortion, a priest’s right to marry or the demand by some that women be allowed to become priests.

Remember the Reformation?

Whenever controversy occurs, the church’s reaction has been to keep its course. There’s no room for debate. Along the way, it has made enemies but it continues on its unyielding way because, after all, the church of St. Peter has lasted for this long.

That’s a shame because it doesn’t have to make an enemy of Ramirez.

He’s the kind of Catholic the archdiocese wants. He isn’t some wild-eyed rabble-rouser; he’s a law-abiding man who wants what’s right for himself and others who worship at St. Thomas.

He doesn’t want to talk to reporters but he feels he must because of the archdiocese’s arrogant refusal to take into account the feelings of St. Thomas’ parishioners.

He was hurt when he read the predictable comment by archdiocese spokesman Father Gregory Coiro, who told Times reporter Denise Hamilton:

“The church has never been democratic in that things are put for a vote. The church is a hierarchy.”

“I would never do to the archdiocese what it is doing to us,” Ramirez said when I spoke with him. “There’s not been one encouraging word from the archdiocese on this. I keep praying for help.”

Ramirez even went to see Mahony last month to seek an explanation.

“Cardinal Mahony gave me one minute,” he recalls. “We weren’t ready to protest. We don’t want to embarrass the cardinal.”

Ramirez emphasized that St. Thomas’ parishioners--Latino, white and Asian--believe they will become strangers in the reconstituted parish. This is especially true for Latinos because they make up more than half of the 3.5 million Catholics in the archdiocese. Also, 197 of the archdiocese’s 284 parishes celebrate Spanish-language Masses.

The archbishop listened but was unmoved. He later announced St. Thomas’ conversion to a center for Chinese American evangelism.

Since then, Ramirez and others staged a protest march at the archdiocese headquarters in Downtown L.A. They say they will no longer give money to the church. They talk of involving local Latino political leaders, such as County Supervisor Gloria Molina, in the squabble.

And they continue to pray.

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In the end, you know Ramirez will lose. Dissenters always lose in the church.

In his shoes, I would have told the archdiocese where it could stick its arrogant view of its flock. But not Ramirez.

“Somebody said he knew how we could win this,” he says. “Get about 25 people from St. Thomas, call a news conference and say they’re turning into Protestants. I said, ‘Cut it out.’ We still want to be obedient. I still want to be a righteous man even if our enemy is not righteous.

“With Jesus’ help, we will confront them.”