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| The several roofs of Saint Bernadette, doing their job -- more or less. |
That sense has postponed my sharing with you one of the projects we have actually been pursuing for over a year: the roof on our church. We have tested it and examined it and repaired it and it just seems to have come to the point that we have to replace it. Oh, it is not a catastrophe, but since we want to restore, refresh, and repaint the interior of the church, it is something of a prior necessity to make the roof sound and reliable. I thought we had achieved that four years ago, but developments since then have proven this thought wrong.
It took some time to come to this conclusion, but the evidence keeps coming in. The past year has been a time famous for the difficulty of getting onto the calendar of a good contractor, and roofing contractors are hardly different. Our roof is large and complex, and not just any roofer has what it takes to undertake the whole project. And even if they do have that, it is astonishing how long it takes to prepare a proposal and estimate.
The heart of the matter is that the various components of the roof that we have repaired since the new roof was installed twenty years ago -- the flashing upgrades, vents, sealers, and such -- are not working together to do their jobs. And the bugbear of the whole system is the built-in gutters. These copper liners are inserted into the limestone cornices that surround and distinguish the exterior of our church building, and they are worn out in several places and repaired and worn out again. They need to be replaced, and to avoid the failures that come from bit-by-bit repairs, the rest of the roof needs to be replaced at the same time, and in a way that locks into the new gutters in the most secure and lasting way possible.
Even after a year or more of trying to get this done, it is still premature to tell you exactly what we are going to do. But we are close to being able to accept a proposal and move forward, which is a hard prerequisite to doing any of the work for which we conducted our capital campaign over the past three years.
All of your donations toward that campaign are intact and secure, and none has been spent, In fact, we have even added to the total. This pause that has been imposed by this very uncertainty about the roof. We will have to direct some of it toward this roof repair, which is only fitting since that is the first step toward the renewal we desire. But the good news is that we will be able to pay for a large percentage of the roof project with the capital maintenance funds of the parish budget. That amount is stronger just now because enrollment in the school is up, which frees up church funds for church work.
Of course, as anybody knows who even pays a passing glance to the news, it is a terrible time to undertake a project like this. Materials are scarce and costs rising fast, and the contractors are still much in demand. The supply chain is not our friend right now, to put it mildly. Nonetheless, we are moving forward and we think we should be able to arrange something soon, though the work might be done months from now, even next year some time.
It took us almost a month to get that new refrigerator for the rectory for these same reasons, but for certain necessities these difficulties must be forborne. The roof is one of those necessities. It must be done before we renew the rest of our church. Once this is scheduled, then we can start the project we are all so eager to see; that will be enjoyable.
Practical matters are rarely the most fun to discuss, but fun doesn’t keep the church dry.
Monsignor Smith
