Image provided by the New York City Police Department shows a missing tabernacle and damaged angel statue in the Roman Catholic Church of Saint Augustine in New York’s Brooklyn’s Park Slope neighborhood, which has been destroyed stolen from Thursday to Saturday.
NYPD via AP
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NYPD via AP
Image provided by the New York City Police Department shows a missing tabernacle and damaged angel statue in the Roman Catholic Church of Saint Augustine in New York’s Brooklyn’s Park Slope neighborhood, which has been destroyed stolen from Thursday to Saturday.
NYPD via AP
Police say someone broke into the altar at a New York City church, stole a $2 million gold relic and took the head of an angel statue at some point. on last weekend.
The incident happened between 6:30 p.m. Thursday and 4 p.m. Saturday at St. Augustine, known as the “Cathedral of Notre Dame” of the Park Slope neighborhood in Brooklyn.
The church was closed for construction at that time. The church’s pastor said camera recordings from the church’s security system were also stolen.
The Diocese of Brooklyn called it “a shameless crime of disrespect and hatred.”
The diocese said thieves or robbers cut through a protective metal shell and made of a tabernacle dating back to the church’s opening in the 1890s.
Police and the diocese said the tabernacle, a box containing Communion objects, was made of 18-carat gold and decorated with jewels. It is valued at $2 million.
The diocese said it was irreplaceable because of its historical and artistic value.
According to a guidebook posted on the church’s website, the tabernacle was built in 1895 and restored in 1952 and 2000.
It is described as a “masterpiece and one of the most expensive tabernacles in the country, protected by its own security system”, which includes an “electronically operated anti-theft safe” and steel plates. one inch thick” completely envelops the tabernacle.
The diocese said angel statues next to the tabernacle had been beheaded and destroyed. A safe in the sacristy, where priests prepared for Mass, was also broken into, but there was nothing inside.
The Eucharistic Jesus, the bread consecrated as the body of Christ, was taken from the tabernacle and thrown on the altar.
“This is devastating, because the Tabernacle is the central focal point of our church beyond worship, where the Body of Christ, the Eucharist, is delivered to the sick and family,” said Pastor. Frank Tumino, pastor of Saint Augustine said. in a statement released by the diocese.
“To learn that a thief has entered the most sacred space of our beautiful Cathedral and is so painful to break into the security system is a disgusting act of disrespect,” said Tumino.
