The effort to save five Downtown Jersey City Roman Catholic parishes by uniting them as Resurrection parish has ended and the pending sale of St. Bridget’s Church will mean only two of the original five will remain as houses of worship.

“We have been entertaining proposals from several people interested in the property and in the next couple of days we will be receiving the bids and we hope to have an answer in the next two weeks,” Newark Archdiocese spokesman Jim Goodness said of the sale of St. Bridget’s Church, located at 370 Montgomery St.

In 1997 the parishes of St. Bridget’s, St. Peter’s, St. Boniface, St. Mary’s and St. Michael's churches were joined to form the Resurrection parish, but in February Resurrection was dissolved.

St. Peter’s and St. Boniface churches have been sold. St. Mary’s High School remained open, but later closed. The 127-year-old St. Bridget’s Church remained open but has been rarely used, Goodness said.

A number of parish schools were united under Resurrection at three Downtown locations, but they have also closed. Children that had been attending Resurrection Grammar School have been absorbed into St. Joseph’s Grammar School.

In a city where once it seemed there was a Catholic school on every block, only five archdiocesan elementary schools remain.

“In the parish situation that exists now, the St. Bridget Church building is not as needed as originally had been envisioned in 1997 -- almost 20 years ago,” Goodness said. “Now an eventual sale of the building will benefit the two surviving parishes, St. Michael’s and St. Mary’s, financially.”

Goodness said the two parishes have the ability to care for the dwindling number of parishioners that had once attended the five parishes. He said he does not know what use prospective buyers have in mind for the St. Bridget’s Church property.

In 1994 there were 238 parishes in the Archdiocese of Newark which is comprised of Essex, Hudson, Union and Bergen counties. Today there are 218. In 1994 there were 168 Catholic schools in the archdiocese. Now there are 70, Goodness said.

St. Bridget's rectory, convent and school, consisting of two three-story buildings and one five-story building, were converted to St. Bridget's Senior Residence earlier this year.

The residence was developed by RCG Development Group and the Alpert Group, with construction by Lindemon Winckelmann, Dupree Martin & Associates, and F.A.S.T. Construction in partnership with the Ccty of Jersey City, Enterprise Community Investment, Inc., TD Bank, and the New Jersey Housing and Mortgage Finance Agency.

Goodness said “The problem and the challenge is that Jersey City is a very dynamic city and the church has to change all the time. Our latest move to establish St. Mary’s and St. Michael’s as parishes is an attempt to meet the community’s needs better.”

The last entry in the history of St. Bridget’s Church published on the Resurrection website reads, “May God continue to use St. Bridget's as the vehicle of his grace to the people of Jersey City for years to come.”