Two days before an MLB team unveiled plans for a new stadium, the team’s owner called the local bishop.
The owner wasn’t looking for a blessing or advice. He wanted to invite the prelate to the press conference.
Bishop James Vann Johnston of Kansas City-St. Joseph was a bit confused. Why did the Kansas City Royals want a Catholic bishop at a stadium announcement?
That’s when team owner John Sherman did explaining — there had been some changes to the proposed stadium’s location. One of the bishop’s parishes would have a new neighbor.
In original discussions, Our Lady of Sorrows, a historic Kansas City parish, might have been about a mile from the new stadium.
In the new plans, home plate could sit about a hundred yards from the church tower.
In renderings he saw, “the edge of the stadium is in the parking lot of the church!” Johnston told The Pillar.
“The stadium is literally feet from the church.”
The press conference came last Wednesday, as the Kansas City Royals announced plans for their new home in Kansas City, Missouri’s Crown Center. And Johnston told The Pillar that in his view, the new stadium offers a new basepath for evangelization.
“I was called by the owner of the Royals inviting me to the press conference. He said, ‘Everyone thinks the stadium’s going to be in Washington Park, but it’s actually going to be in Crown Center and it’s going to be right next to the church,’” Johnston recalled.
“Sherman added, ‘I’d like you to be there because we want you to be involved in the discussions and the planning around the project,’” the bishop told The Pillar.
“The new stadium presents a wonderful opportunity to give the church and the parish a new chapter in its history,” Johnston said. “We want people to make the parish a part of their game day experience.”
As people make their way to the stadium, “we will consider [convenient] Mass times, and how to keep the church open for those who would want to come in for confession, or for adoration or prayer,” the bishop explained.
“For those that are not Catholic, I think it gives us a great gateway to other people who might not otherwise have a relationship to the Church,” Johnston said.
Crown Center, near downtown Kansas City, is a shopping center and entertainment complex close to the city’s restaurants, hotels, downtown apartments and condos, and the nearby Union Station. At the center of the area is the headquarters for Hallmark, the famous greeting cards company.
Initial plans for the new stadium proposed that the stadium be built in Washington Park, a neighborhood near Crown Center, but about a mile away from the church.
Instead, Hallmark is partnering with the Royals to build the 85-acre development site, which will include Hallmark’s new company headquarters, shops and restaurants, and the “world-class stadium.” The project is expected to cost roughly $2 billion.
At the edge of the development site stands Our Lady of Sorrows.
“Mr. Sherman, and David Hall, who is the CEO for Hallmark, both told me that they want this ballpark to be a neighborhood ballpark,” Johnston said. “They want this stadium to blend into the neighborhood.”
“They told me that they’re committed that the church spire will be the tallest thing. It will be taller than the stadium itself!”
Our Lady of Sorrows has a long history — founded by German immigrants in 1922, the city of Kansas City has grown and developed around it. The church has become a popular wedding venue, and is frequently filled with young professionals and medical staff for Sunday and daily Masses.
But in recent years, the parish has changed, as longtime parishioners move from the area.
“It’s dwindled in terms of its parish size as the old parishioners move out, but there are a lot more young adults that live down there that are going to Mass and many of the hospital workers and medical students go there,” Johnston said. “The church itself is beautiful. It’s an iconic church, beautiful on the outside and the inside.”
The bishop noted that Our Lady of Sorrows is one of several parishes benefiting from a growing number of young adults in the region interested in Catholicism.
“We’ve seen an increase exponentially here, and not only there at Our Lady of Sorrows … but all three of our downtown parishes have seen that. We have one of the most dynamic young adult ministries in the nation here — City on a Hill — and we have seen really great growth in the number of young adult Catholics involved.”
The bishop said he sees the Holy Spirit in the number of young adults taking up the practice of the faith.
“I think there’s something ultimately attributable to the work of God through the Holy Spirit, and I think the Holy Spirit’s using some of the dislocation that people have felt, the shaking of people’s realities … part of that has been COVID, part of it is attributable to, I think, just the rancor that people experience in almost every quarter of life, and some of the disconnect that they feel.”
“I don’t want to beat the drum too hard on the effects of social media, but I do think a lot of these things have combined to shake people, almost existentially, and that’s resulted in an opening of the heart, I think, to the presence of God and maybe a seeking for something true, which can be counted on.”
“I think people are looking for something in this time of great instability and upheaval. In my opinion, there’s been an almost existential upheaval that’s been happening for a couple of decades now, and I think younger people — without a lot of past experience or biases that previous generations had — are more open to religion.”
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In the near term, Johnston believes the stadium’s presence will be a benefit for the parish, with residential development likely bringing more Catholics to the area.
That could change the experience of parish life, and might change the parish financial future, too, Johnston conceded.
“There’s going to be a big commitment to more residential and commercial investment in that area, which I think is going to lead to a lot more people living downtown. I have great hopes that this will help the parish, not only financially, but with growth and parishioners,” Johnston said.
“The church has been an iconic part of Kansas City for a long time, but I think now it’s even going to be more recognizable, almost as a landmark that’s associated with the stadium,” Johnston said. “It’ll be so close that when it’s on TV, the church will be right there with the stadium.”
The bishop told The Pillar that he’s excited on a personal level that the new stadium will mean he can walk to games. A Braves fan in childhood, the Royals won him over, he said,winning the 2015 World Series a few days before his installation as the new bishop.
“I’m excited because I live downtown and once the stadium’s here, I’ll be able to just walk to a ball game and I’m a baseball fan,” Johnston said. “The 2015 victory parade was the day before my installation Mass and so I’ve adopted them very readily.”
But he’s mostly excited for what the stadium could mean for the Gospel.
“With a lot of visitors — a lot of people coming through — it’ll be a way for us to have some encounters with others that are not Catholic or not Christian,” Johnston said.
“It will be a way for us to do some evangelization that really works in that context.”