Disagreement and Controversy
Although the parish had competely recovered financially from the Depression, the strain of the years of deprivation and hardship was still being felt. By the mid-1940s a crisis was in the making. It had been twenty years since the founding of the parish and people were upset about the lack of progress. The school, even with the recent addition, was still too small to accommodate all of the parish children. They did not have a convent; the Sisters commuted from Villa Angela. They had only recently purchased a rectory; before that, the priests had been living in a rented house that was over a mile from the parish property. Worst of all, they still did not have a church.
The parishioners were frustrated and angry. For twenty years they had been doing everything they could do to support the parish. They had worked hard and responded generously whenever they were asked, often at great personal sacrifice; now they felt they had little to show for it. After the years of countless fund drives, they were beginning to wonder where their money was going.
But it wasn't just the inadequacy of the facilities that was bothering them; it was also the lack of a shared life as a community. The socials and organizations they had enjoyed so much in the early years of the parish had been abandoned during the thirties as the focus shifted to surviving the Depression. Now that times had changed, parishioners wanted social and spiritual activities to bring them together and support them in their faith. They saw the things that other parishes were doing and wanted the same things here: service organizations, monthly communion Sundays for specific groups, a youth group, a children's Mass, and parties for fun instead of fundraising.
At times, parishioners had tried to start new clubs or groups, but they were invariably discouraged by the lack of support of the pastor. They felt that Dr. Kirby did not approve of activities of any kind and would not cooperate with their efforts to breathe new life into the parish.
In 1946, a group of men decided to try to do something new to help the parish. With assistant pastor Father Murphy's help, they formed the Holy Cross Men's Club. Their goal was to raise money to support extracurricular activities in the school, like the Boosters do today. The Men's Club sponsored athletic teams by purchasing uniforms and equipment and paying league fees. They put on a Christmas party at the school and bought Christmas presents for all the Sisters. In the spring, they paid for a graduation party and awarded prizes to the students with the best academic records. Nothing like that had ever been done before at Holy Cross, although it was common in other parishes.
In 1947, they elected officers and invited Dr. Kirby to meet with them to give them a plan for the coming year. He agreed to the meeting but then skipped it with no explanation. Instead, he sent them a program that would have cost several thousand dollars to implement, and at the same time restricted their options for fundraising so much that it would have been impossible for them to raise that amount. Several months later, Dr. Kirby announced that a Holy Name Society would be formed within the parish, with the implication that the Men's Club would be disbanded.
By this time, the tension in the parish had become intolerable. Angry letters had been pouring into the chancery, and parishioners began holding meetings and circulating petitions calling for Dr. Kirby to be removed as pastor. The climax came in November, 1947, when the officers of the Men's Club met with the chancellor of the diocese to discuss the deteriorating situation in the parish. The meeting led to a series of discussions between diocesan officials and Dr Kirby, who almost from the beginning expressed his willingness to accept a transfer. On April 16, 1948 he was reassigned to Sacred Heart Parish in Oberlin.
