CLEVELAND (AP) – Officials at the Cleveland airport say they’re considering moving its chapel because some visitors say the space is "too Catholic."
Cleveland Hopkins International Airport rents the large space to the Catholic Diocese of Cleveland for $1,200 a year. But as officials plan to renovate that concourse, they are talking with the diocese about moving the space or perhaps making it less denomination specific.
The Rev. Charles Doerpers says the diocese is open to making the chapel more inclusive to other faiths. But he also thinks money is the issue and fears the airport only wants the space for retail shops.
The American Civil Liberties Union has long complained about the space’s Catholic-specific space.
Well all they have to do is hire Fr. Dick Vosco and in no time they will have it looking less Catholic.
9 comments
Let me get this straight.
1. Cleveland’s Catholic diocese pays the rent.
2. Out of the kindness of their heart, they let non-Catholics use the space.
3. The ACLU is protesting the services provided by a private group in a rented space.
Obviously, the ACLU also has a problem with religion books in airport bookstores, religious T-shirts in airport clothes stores, and religious souvenirs in airport souvenir shops.
Tell me, does the ACLU spend its spare time trying to change the religious names of American towns?
Can’t the ACLU pay the rent for the space of their own church in the airport? It’s outrageous to ask the diocese, if they are footing the bill to change their chapel. How stupid can you get?
Amazing. And stupid. All at once.
And typical American.
You know, I’ll be heading to Cleveland in July…I can stop into the chapel maybe and report on it live from Cleveland when I’m there.
Wow. Thing is, that’s my airport, and yet I never noticed there was a chapel.
Of course, no matter how “Catholic” it is at the moment, I’m pretty certain that to my eyes it won’t look that Catholic.
All I can tell the ACLU is to wait a couple years; ever since I was a kid, Cleveland has been constantly ripping up its airport and rebuilding it completely. There’s not one thing I remember from even five years ago, which is different from ten years ago, and from 15, and…etc. No doubt next year the space will be “too Jewish”, “too Quaker”, “too Zen Buddhist”, whatever.
Cleveland should just make the temple into a mosque and have done with it; ever notice how Islam is the one religion the ACLU never bothers?
I love that chapel! When I was flying in and out through Cleveland while working in northern Ohio, I used to really enjoy going there, even when I wasn’t Catholic. I always wish that the other airports I visit had a chapel like that. Most don’t even seem to have any chapel.
“Officials at the Cleveland airport say they’re considering moving its chapel because some visitors say the space is “too Catholic.”
What would be less Catholic and more acceptable to the ACLU getting rid of the chapel and putting in a Muslim footbath?
Too Catholic thats like me walking around Japan complaining the shrines are “too Shinto” and the temples are “too Buddhist.” By the way both religions have stuck to their traditional building styles and Ive never seen or heard of a “modern” temple or shrine.
Which means one thing, they’re doing a good job it it’s offending someone.
I think they should change it into another Starbucks.