Will a Buffalo Catholic church become a mosque? Here’s what to know

Aerial view of Buffalo, New York, with a focus on St. Ann’s Roman Catholic Church (left). / Credit: Library of Congress online catalog

CNA Staff, Aug 13, 2024 / 15:32 pm (CNA).

After a viral social media post on Sunday highlighted the sale of a prominent Catholic church in Buffalo to a Muslim group, the timeline for the church’s ultimate conversion to a mosque remains unclear. 

The Diocese of Buffalo sold the former St. Ann’s Church and Shrine to a group associated with the local Downtown Islamic Center in late 2022. 

The Buffalo News reported that Buffalo Crescent Holdings, a group associated with the Downtown Islamic Center, purchased the property in November 2022 for $250,000. The Islamic Center already operates a small place of worship near the former church. 

Plans for a multimillion-dollar project at one point included an Islamic school and college for as many as 3,000 students, a shopping plaza, and a Muslim funeral home, the Buffalo News reported in 2022.

For its part, however, the Downtown Islamic Center has not updated its website with new information about the renovation since July 2022 but appears to still be accepting donations for the project. 

CNA reached out to the Downtown Islamic Center via email to ask about the current status of the mosque’s plans but did not hear back by time of publication. When reached by phone, a volunteer at the Downtown Islamic Center told CNA that only “minor updates” are being done to the former St. Ann’s property at the moment, such as repairing a door and cutting the grass. 

The troubled Diocese of Buffalo, meanwhile, announced the sale of its downtown headquarters in March for nearly $10 million. The diocese had in 2020 formally filed for Chapter 11 reorganization under the U.S. bankruptcy code, and diocesan officials announced in October 2023 that the diocese would be putting forth $100 million to settle the numerous abuse claims lodged against it.

What happened to the church?

St. Ann’s, a historic German parish first established in 1886, was closed more than a decade ago amid estimates that it could take millions of dollars to renovate the property. The parish had been merged with another one in 2007 amid a diocesan-wide parish consolidation process. 

In 2014, the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Clergy decreed that St. Ann’s could not be sold or repurposed for profane use (meaning a secular purpose). The Buffalo Diocese had already closed the shrine in 2012 when structural issues were found and originally wanted to demolish the property but later sought to sell the complex to a secular developer. 

The Church’s highest court, the Apostolic Signatura, in 2017 under prefect Cardinal Dominique Mamberti reversed the dicastery’s decree at the request of then-Bishop Richard Malone, allowing the property to be sold.

“Now that the Vatican has ruled, the decision to close the church is final,” Malone said in a statement to the Buffalo News at the time.

“We will do all that we can, within the confines of safety and feasibility, to remove all sacred and artistically significant artifacts.”

The Buffalo News notes that if St. Ann’s does ultimately become a mosque, it would not be the first Catholic church in Buffalo to become one. Darul Uloom Al Madania, an Islamic school, in 1994 bought the former Holy Mother of Rosary Polish National Catholic Cathedral. In 2009, the former Queen of Peace Church was purchased and converted into a mosque.