Vatican rejects appeals from 10 closed parishes in Boston area

By Lisa Wangsness, Globe Staff

Ten Boston-area churches that were closed by the Archdiocese have lost their final appeal to the Vatican to remain open, according to a spokesperson for the Council of Parishes, which includes eight of shuttered churches.

Spokesman Bill Bannon said the council's president, Peter Borre, heard the news this morning when he spoke by telephone with Carlo Gullo, a canon lawyer in Rome who represented the group before the Vatican's highest court, the Apostolic Signatura.

Three of the 10 parishes have maintained constant vigils in protest of their closure for years: St. Francis Cabrini in Scituate and St. James the Great in Wellesley have been in vigil since October 2004, and St. Jeremiah in Framingham has been in vigil since May 2005.

The other parishes represented by the council include Ste. Jeanne d'Arc in Lowell; Infant Jesus/St. Lawrence in Brookline; Star of the Sea in Squantum, Our Lady of Lourdes in Revere; St. Michael the Archangel in Lynn. The other two parishes are Sacred Heart in Natick and St. Anselm in Sudbury.

A spokesman for the Archdiocese of Boston was not immediately available for comment.