Ann Arbor nuns buy D.C. cultural center

[buffalo]

Ann Arbor nuns buy D.C. cultural center

A community of traditional Catholic nuns based in Ann Arbor has signed a purchase agreement to buy the financially-troubled Pope John Paul II Cultural Center in Washington, D.C., a project of former Detroit Cardinal Adam Maida and which was heavily-financed with money from the Catholic Archdiocese of Detroit.

Read more: Ann Arbor nuns buy D.C. cultural center | freep.com | Detroit Free Press freep.com/article/20101026/NEWS06/101026016/Ann-Arbor-nuns-buy-D-C-cultural-center#ixzz13Z8zmhSJ

 

[Dale_M]

I think it strange that the archdiocese of Detroit would build a museum/research center/conference center 500 miles away.

I’m not familiar with the history of the center, but apparently it has been bleeding money since it opened, with no prospects of a turn around. Here is an article from 2006, when 90% of the staff were cut.

With Pope John Paul’s endorsement, the center’s founders opened the 100,000-square-foot facility in Northeast Washington in March 2001 with aspirations of turning it into a major cultural institution – where scholars would research Catholicism’s role and influence, where religious leaders would gather for interfaith dialogue, where regular people would explore God and spirituality.

Five years later, it is $40 million in debt and has not drawn the attendance or financial support its founders expected. During a 2 1/2 -hour period Thursday, only two visitors passed through.

“It was a train wreck waiting to happen,” Monsignor William A. Kerr, the center’s executive director, said of the project. Part museum, part think tank and part public meeting space, the center has lacked a clear focus, making it hard to raise money, Kerr said.

washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/11/AR2006021100843_pf.html

I wonder what the Dominican sisters plan on doing with the building?

 

[barb_finnegan]

The Sisters are going to turn it into a student residence for the members of their community-at least that’s what I read in the original article.

I didn’t like the tone of the article-I read it on ‘Spirit Daily’-the writer had a snarky tone, which is typical of the secular press when writing about the Church. There was even a comment from Father Thomas Reese, the liberal Jesuit from ‘America’ magazine; as usual, he was sarcastic.

I know that EWTN’s ‘The World Over’ newscast comes from there. I wonder if it will have to find another ‘home’ after the Sisters take it over?

I also get mailings from there, too.