By Anna Weaver | Hawaii Catholic Herald

Almost a year after West Hawaii off-shore earthquakes revealed extensive deterioration of the mortar holding together St. Michael Church in Kailua-Kona, the building was labeled a “dangerous structure” and closed on Sept. 24.

The fate of the lava rock church, which was built in 1850, remains uncertain. Masses and other church services and activities will be held at a former movie theater nearby that St. Michael’s recently leased until either repairs are made to the existing building or a new church is built.

Tom Peters, the chairperson of St. Michael’s Planning and Building Committee, said the closing of the church was a shock.

“It’s an emotional thing … for the many, many generations that have lived and worshipped at the church,” he said. “St. Michael’s is a part of who we are.”

Peters said that an initial examination by a local structural engineer of the church a few months after the Oct. 15, 2006, earthquakes showed that the coral and sand mortar in the walls had turned to dust.

“It was not apparent until the earthquake happened and we actually had some of the stucco and rocks fall out that we were able to see that this is not a very well-held together building,” he said.

After the structural review, St. Michael’s balcony and bell tower, which received the most quake damage, were closed but the church remained in use while it took two months to get a rehabilitation plan. However, contractors hired to carry out the local engineer’s recommendations told the building committee that repairs might cause walls to collapse.

Peters said at that point the church turned for a second opinion to California-based engineering firm MKM & Associates, which had experience with earthquake-damaged buildings. As soon as the firm told the building committee that the church was a danger, it was closed on Sept. 24. Weekend services were celebrated outside the following two weekends and weekday Masses took place in the nearby church hall.

St. Michael’s has taken a three-year lease on the nearby Hualalai Theatres, which had been vacant for several years. Religious education classes will be held in a small side theater and the wall between two other theaters will be removed to create a space that can accommodate the parish’s large Mass congregations.

Because the church building and particularly the bell tower could collapse at any time, all of St. Michael’s interior furnishings have been removed, including the stained glass windows installed in 1995.

On Oct. 6, the bell tower roof was removed and the church bell, which was cast in Paris in 1853, was lifted out by crane. It will be displayed in front of the now empty and taped-off church.

As for the question of whether to rehabilitate or rebuild St. Michael’s, the parish will have to wait a few months for MKM & Associates to finish developing repair plans and for an estimate from contractors on the repair costs.

The final decision will be made by Bishop Larry Silva in consultation with St. Michael’s planning and building committee and the diocesan planning and building commission. Bishop Silva was on the Big Island on Oct. 26 and made a special trip to St. Michael’s to check on the church’s situation firsthand.

Peters says that there is a way to repair the existing church by building a new church within the old one, but that would reduce the size of an already too small worship space.

Before the earthquake, St. Michael’s had begun plans to build a new hall and meeting and office space. Now the issue of the main church is being added to those plans.

“From a historic standpoint, the church has been changed enough that … it probably doesn’t qualify as a historic structure anymore,” Peters says.

He said that some parishioners have told him, “It’s too bad, but she’s been serving us for 157 years and she’s tired. Maybe she’s telling us that she wants to rest.”

The Mission of St. Michael the Archangel was founded July 5, 1840, with a grass church as its first gathering place. Ten years later, Sacred Hearts Father Joachim Marechal built the present church and it was blessed in 1855. A major restoration effort took place in 1935 and the church was renovated and air-conditioned in 1971 and 1972. A new roof was put on in the 1980s.

Repair plans are in progress for one of St. Michael’s three missions, St. Paul in Keauhou, which was also damaged in the quake and evaluated by MKM & Associates. St. Paul was constructed in the same way as St. Michael’s and built about 14 years after the Kailua church. However, the mission church received less damage because it was eight miles farther from the earthquake’s epicenter, sits at a higher elevation, and has shorter and thicker walls.