[MeredithMan]

As reported in today's Citizen, copied in below. Anyone have any scoop on what the property might be used for? I can remember going there as a kid in the summer in the mid 70's....the place was always packed, with multiple masses on Saturday afternoons and Sunday mornings. It now joins the pantheon of restaurants, summer camps, and other area attractions that have bitten the dust....

LACONIA — After a year on the market, St. Helena’s Mission Church in The Weirs is about to be sold.

Agent Christian Stallkamp of commercial real estate firm CBRE/Portsmouth said Tuesday that a potential buyer for the church and surrounding property has stepped forward, but wishes to remain anonymous until the purchase has been completed.

“We’re working toward a closing and that should happen sometime this month,” Stallkamp said. “It’s a great property and a great opportunity for the potential buyer.”

The asking price for the church and property is $349,000 and it was put on the market by the Diocese of Manchester in December 2013.

Stallkamp said he would not disclose the sales price for the church and property until the transaction closes.

St. Helena’s Mission Church offered summer Mass for local residents and tourists visiting the Lakes Region. It has 5,200 square feet of floor space with a basement and sits on three acres of land at 326 Endicott St. East less than a mile from Weirs Beach.

Prior to the construction of St. Helena’s, Sunday Masses were celebrated at Irwin’s Winnipesaukee Gardens in The Weirs. Dances were held there on Saturday nights and then hundreds attended Mass the following morning.

A local couple who owned The Weirs Hotel, Helene and Ralph Poudrier, were active in promoting The Weirs and Lake Winnipesaukee as a vacation spot and donated the land for St. Helena’s to be used as a place of worship for vacationers and local residents.

Bishop Matthew F. Brady of the Diocese of Manchester, a friend of the Poudrier family, officially dedicated St. Helena's on July 10, 1955 and it was named in honor of Helene Poudrier’s patron saint, St. Helena.

In 2010, the Diocese of Manchester merged the former Our Lady of the Lakes Church in Lakeport and St. Helena Mission Church with St. André Bessette Parish of Laconia.

Our Lady of the Lakes was closed in 2012 and the church and property were sold to the Evangelical Baptist Church.

Rev. Marc Drouin of St. André Bessette Parish was the final pastor at St. Helena and he said that at the end, the church was only celebrating two Masses there during summer weekends.

“We calculated it was only in use for about 24 hours each year,” Drouin said. “The building committee looked at substantial financial resources required for building maintenance and declining attendance. All of those factors, combined with the fact that St. André Bessette Parish’s two Catholic churches — Sacred Heart and St. Joseph’s — are within six or seven miles of St. Helena, the recommendation was made to close the church.”

A petition was formally made in April 2013 to Bishop Peter A. Libasci to close St. Helena's and a formal closing ceremony was held there in September 2013.

The pews have been sold to another Catholic church in New Hampshire and all ecclesiastical goods and objects of artistic or historical value belonging to St. Helena’s were transferred to St. André Bessette Parish following its closing ceremony.

“There are always mixed feelings involved in the sale of a church. St. Helena was our last remaining property from Our Lady of the Lakes Parish, which was merged into Saint Andre Bessette Parish in 2010, so I know for the parishioners this is sad news," Drouin said. "On the other hand, there is a sense of relief that we are able to close that chapter and move on, and of course we are glad that we were able to sell the building in this market.

"As we move forward as the new parish of Saint André Bessette, we do so with joyful hope, trusting that the Lord is with us,” he said.

Drouin said proceeds from the sale of St. Helena's will go to the St. André Bessette Parish operating fund.

The sale of St. Helena's follows a recent trend of churches being put up for sale in Laconia.

The old Evangelical Baptist Church at 12 Veterans Square was sold in 2013 to David Kennedy of Epping, who is turning it into an Irish-themed pub and eatery called The Holy Grail of the Lakes.

St. James Episcopal Church at 876 North Main St. was sold the Boys & Girls Club of the Lakes Region for $2.4 million in 2012.