CLEVELAND (AP) — The Vatican has taken the extraordinary step of overruling the closing of 13 parishes by the Cleveland Diocese, a lawyer who fought the cutbacks said Wednesday.

The move represents a rare instance in which Rome has reversed a U.S. bishop on the shutdown of churches.

The Vatican office known as the Congregation for the Clergy ruled last week that Bishop Richard Lennon failed to follow church law and procedure in the closings three years ago, attorney Peter Borre told The Associated Press.

The 13 churches were among 50 shut down or merged by Lennon, who said the eight- county diocese could no longer afford to keep them open because of declining numbers of parishioners and a shortage of priests.

Many of the 13 parishes are in poor, inner-city Cleveland neighborhoods. Some were founded by Irish, Hungarian or Polish immigrants but are now in sections of the city that are heavily black and non-Catholic.

Parishioners, many of them second- and third-generation members of the churches, challenged some of the closings, staged sit-ins and other protests and even created a breakaway congregation.

The bishop can appeal to the Vatican’s high court. It was not clear whether he could simply restart the process, follow the correct procedure and close the churches all over again.