It was once said that for every bar that was built, a church was also created. Now, however, it seems the tables have turned on the sacred institutions.

We might have to turn that phrase into: "For every bar built on Ballard Ave and Market St, a church must turn into a condo, a townhouse or narrow single-family residences.

Such is the case for the Calvary Lutheran Church, which was left empty in 2009 when the congregation of Calvary merged with Our Redeemers Lutheran Church. Now, according to the Department of Planning and Development, an application is in for Calvary's demolition, to be replaced by four single-family residences. (We took a look in April at the Art Church, which is being replaced by a townhouse and a single-family house )

The Icelandic community of Ballard started Calvary Lutheran in 1902. It was known as Hallgrim's Congregation at the time.

More recently, in 2009, the vacant space at Calvary acted as a 20-person homeless shelter for the Seattle Housing and Resource Effort (SHARE). Ultimately, the shelter was closed after a sex offender was discovered to be living in the encampment (who was removed) and Our Redeemers and SHARE could not come to an agreement on background checks.

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