This year's Palm Sunday in Dunedin will be remembered for a mass closure of Catholic churches.
Three Catholic churches in south Dunedin shut their doors today for the last time, with the congregations all merging at the nearby St Patrick's Basilica.
St Bridgid's is one of three churches in Dunedin having its last service this weekend.
Falling numbers and changing times means the churches will congregate into one at the newly renovated St Patrick's Basilica.
"There's a matter of sadness, so we wanted to acknowledge the different things that have occurred in these churches before we move on to create our new community," says Dunedin South parish priest Gerard Aynsley.
Churchgoer Brent Matahaere leaves his local church with many treasured memories.
"It's the end of an era for me. We've come along here as a family since Leonie and I were married in the church in 1995. Our three daughters have been baptised here," he says.
His church joins St Bernadette's and St Alphonsus, all closing their doors.
"I was here for everything, right from the very start, and then I was an altar boy here for years."
The Church acknowledges dwindling numbers are a large part of the reason for the amalgamation.
The 2013 census shows New Zealand Christians have dropped to less than 2 million – a 7 percent drop in seven years. It showed Catholics, though, had overtaken Anglicans as the largest group within that, at nearly 500,000.
"The churches that were built here in the south of Dunedin were built in another era. There were more people and more priests, but there wasn't the same transport," says Mr Aynsley.
But the parishioners say the congregation feels as buoyant as ever.
"The youth tend to find other things to do on a Sunday morning, but they tend to come back as they then begin their families," says parishioner Brent Matahaere.
St Patrick's Basilica will officially re-open in June, but services will still be held there until then.
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