Visitation Academy Chapel by Elyssa Koren / Change.org
CV NEWS FEED // Members of a Maryland community are urging the owners of a luxury hotel not to place a cocktail bar directly on what used to be a chapel’s high altar.
The Marriott Visitation Hotel, which is slated to open Dec. 19, is on the former site of Visitation Academy, a monastery and all-girls school that was open from 1846 until 2005 in Frederick, Maryland.
The Marriott Corporation owns the hotel, and celebrity chef and Frederick native Bryan Voltaggio runs the restaurant, Wye Oak Tavern.
The petition, which includes signatures from Visitation Academy alumni and concerned community members, expresses gratitude that their beloved building will be able to “live on to a new purpose,” but strongly opposes the chosen location of the bar and urges the owners to “restore the dignity of the chapel” by moving it elsewhere.
Despite the chapel being officially deconsecrated, the high altar, side altars, tabernacle, altar rail, stained glass windows, and statues remain. The petitioners view the establishment of a bar on the altar as a significant misappropriation of the sacred space.
“We, Visitation Academy alumni, concerned citizens of Frederick, Maryland, and others dismayed by the use of this space, petition you to make the necessary changes as soon as possible to restore its dignity and respect its holy heritage either by removing the altar and tabernacle or relocating the bar to another location,” the petition states. “We wish you the best with this venture and ask for your serious consideration given the importance of this place to generations of women and their families from Frederick and beyond.”
Elyssa Koren, a graduate of the Academy and a practicing attorney, initiated the petition.
“Across the country, we are seeing our sacred spaces repurposed for secular use,” Koren said in a press release. “While we can’t bring our beloved school and monastery back, we can exercise our basic right to petition the owners to relocate the cocktail bar away from the high altar as a gesture of goodwill, especially as we head into Christmas.”
Koren acknowledged the owners’ efforts to preserve the building’s architecture but emphasized that placing a bar in the chapel contradicts its historical significance. She encouraged others who share a commitment to respecting former places of worship to support the petition.
“You don’t have to be a Christian to be offended by the egregious misuse of this space,” she continued. “They could have put the bar anywhere, but they chose the altar. This is deeply disrespectful to the thousands of women and their families who worshipped there during its over 150-year history as a Catholic chapel.”
The Visitation Academy, run by the Visitation nuns until 2005, saw its order dissolve due to declining numbers, leading the Archdiocese of Baltimore to announce the “suppression” of the monastery. The school continued to operate without the nuns until its closure in 2016.
