By Anna Weaver | Hawaii Catholic Herald
Repercussions from a 6.7-magnitude earthquake off the west side of the Big Island last Oct. 15 are still being felt at St. Joseph Mission in Paauilo, the Catholic church hardest hit by the quake.
Because of safety and health concerns, the Diocese of Honolulu recently recommended that the small north Big Island mission church be demolished. The church is a mission of Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Honokaa.
St. Joseph, which about 70 people had attended regularly until October, has been unsafe to enter since its major beams cracked, the choir side wall collapsed, and bathrooms were damaged in the earthquake.
A nearby hall also shifted three inches and damage occurred to the church cemetery. Church volunteers recently helped to clear a cemetery wall that had collapsed and build a new one.
Diocese of Honolulu vicar general Father Marc Alexander met with parishioners from the mission and Our Lady of Lourdes on May 7 to discuss what should be done about the damage.
The diocesan recommendation to demolish the mission church and not rebuild it in the foreseeable future arose from that meeting, structural examination of the building, and a review of church demographic and statistical data.
In a May 22 letter to the parish’s administrator Father Joseph Diaz, Bishop Larry Silva approved that recommendation and several others.
The other recommendations included the following:
- Holding a small service before the demolition
- Repairing St. Joseph Mission’s hall so that religious education classes, disrupted since last fall, and other community events can resume
- Building a new septic sewer system
- Establishing a special fund for repairs and other purposes
- Repairing a retaining wall at Our Lady of Lourdes.