How bad would Rome let the situation get in the US, before it allows married Priests?

[Hesychios]

shannin:

Do you realize how much it would cost the Church to allow priests to marry?

Just thinkof all those “big Catholic families” that would be supported by the Church.

Shannin

Amusing comment, but perhaps true.

Is what we are truly afraid of that a married priest will take Humanae Vitae seriously, and have more children than the average family?

If so, that is shameful for us. We (as a group) are already looking pretty darn bad about this issue, as a bunch of cheapskates.

Some of the RC parishes around Chicagoland have as many as 20,000 parishioners! I have a friend in the Joliet diocese who proudly proclaims that his parish has 23,000 members. I’ll bet that isn’t unusual in all of the major metropolitan areas.

The average Orthodox parish has (I would have to guess) around 400 families or less. Most Orthodox parishes I am familiar with have an average of 120 to 200 people per an ordinary (non-Feast Day) Sunday liturgy, and only one liturgy per Sunday!

Yet these communities can support a married priesthood.

If we are so darn certain that the gates of hell will not prevail against our church, why is it we are not so sure that the average parish will pony up the money to adequately support a priests’ family? Something is really wrong with this picture!

 

[Hesychios]

bogeyjlg:

How will allowing married priest help the situation? People who are called to the priesthood are not becoming priest because they are not open to the call of God. Allowing married priest will not fix the underlying problem.

Sometimes we don’t realize just how many people have forsaken a vocation to the priesthood because they fell in love.

My parish has six individuals I know of personally who had attended RC seminary and left before ordination to get married. If they were Orthodox or Eastern Catholics at the time, they could have been ordained.

Another usually overlooked point: the priestly vocation also runs in families. It is not uncommon for the sons of priests to follow their dads and grandads into the priesthood. And daughters of priests will often marry seminarians, they are not intimidated by it because they know the life and wish to live with a man who was called by God.

I don’t have any statistical info to share on this topic, but neither does anyone else really, it’s all conjecture. We are believing what we want to believe and looking for reasons to justify our positions.

A lot of it is nostalgia at work, we want it like the old days. But honestly in a big parish no one would see a difference. At Mass it isn’t obvious what the living arrangements of a priest are, at the altar he is a priest and no one would ordinarily know that somewhere in the pews his children are kneeling and praying.

 

[Hesychios]

Brendan:

Rome would look at other options first.

Right now, the Church is very strong in Eastern Europe and Africa. Their seminaries are full and they are turning away canidates.

The seminaries are full because of a seminary shortage, and lack of money to build.

The American church would import priests from these locations first.

Actually, Africa and Asia are experiencing terrible priest shortages, far worse than the USA.

One notable exception is India.

There are plenty of men in those locations would would appreciate a chance to attend seminary here.

This is true, we have plenty of room in our seminaries, the trick is to find some way to pay the expenses.

I know that is happening in Detroit. My associate pastor is from Poland, ordained here, I personally know 5 other Polish priests. And I know of 3 parishes that have priests from Nigeria.

No one ever said a priest in America had to be American.

This is a big issue today, the USA is draining the priest supply from around the world because it has deeper pockets and can lure these people away, when they are so badly needed in their homelands.

My guess is the vocational situation in Poland is not so bad, but the African situation is horrible, as is the Latin American and Brazilian situation. Those Polish priests should ideally be headed for Africa if they want to do real mission work.

But if all they want is a good paying job, I guess an assignment in Chicago or Detroit will work.

+T+
Michael

 

[Ignatius]

Catholic29:

If the priest shortage in America got bad enough to the point where half or more of current US parishes would have to close, do you think Rome would grant US bishops and Indult to ordain married men to the Priesthood?

Or would Rome allow the Catholic Church in America to fall into formal schism, or let the bulk of US Catholics fall into Protestantism or no faith, before it would ever compromise on its disciplines?

I would personally prefer the celibate state for Priests, and I’m certain God does as well. But is the discipline of celibacy so important as to allow parishes to close, with more Catholics having reduced access to the sacraments, as a result of not enough men being ordained?

Personally, I would think that the Holy See would bring in faithful priest from the areas with explosive growth in the Church; such as Africa and Asia.

 

[Bruised_Reed]

Bruised Reed:

If the would-be-priests think they are called to the priesthood, why aren’t they already permanent deacons? Or studying or discerning? How different is the vocation to be a permanent deacon or being a priest when both are married?

Thoughts please.

One other question to add - do proponants of married priests realise that there is time and money involved with the preparation of the priest?

How much time do y’all think most men would be willing to take away from their families to study for the priesthood? Who’s going to support the family in the meantime?

 

[Chris-WA]

Trelow:

The lack of vocations is due to the lack of Catachesis.

I agree with this statement. We don’t have a lack of priests because they can’t marry. We have a lack of priests because our country is full of luke-warm Catholics. Our country is full of luke-warm Catholics because somewhere along the line, we stopped teaching the faith in favor of focussing mostly on social issues. Social issues are important, but without good catechesis, eventually people stop being Catholic, mostly out of ignorance of what it truly means to be Catholic.

 

[Pariah_Pirana]

Catholic29:

If the priest shortage in America got bad enough to the point where half or more of current US parishes would have to close, do you think Rome would grant US bishops and Indult to ordain married men to the Priesthood?

Or would Rome allow the Catholic Church in America to fall into formal schism, or let the bulk of US Catholics fall into Protestantism or no faith, before it would ever compromise on its disciplines?

I would personally prefer the celibate state for Priests, and I’m certain God does as well. But is the discipline of celibacy so important as to allow parishes to close, with more Catholics having reduced access to the sacraments, as a result of not enough men being ordained?

Some points to ponder:

1.) You would do well to read some history of the Church. Today’s “vocations crisis” is nothing new to the Church, yet those without knowledge of the history of the Church believe it is. Further, the huge post WWII surge of priests in the USA and other places was in no way “normal” – although it certainly has happened before in history

2.) It’s quite possible that the approval of a married clergy might well ignite an exodus of existing priests from the Latin Rite pristhood. Look what happened after V2 when the “status” of clerics was “changed.”

3.) Would we follow the traditions of the entire Catholic and Orthodox Churches and continue to preclude all bishops from marriage?

 

[Hesychios]

Chris-WA:

… We don’t have a lack of priests because they can’t marry. We have a lack of priests because our country is full of luke-warm Catholics. Our country is full of luke-warm Catholics because somewhere along the line, we stopped teaching the faith in favor of focussing mostly on social issues. Social issues are important, but without good catechesis, eventually people stop being Catholic, mostly out of ignorance of what it truly means to be Catholic.

This is all true. The culture has gone through a major shift.

Most Catholics are lukewarm at best, and I would bet that most Catholic parents actually discourage their own sons from a vocation to the priesthood these days. Either directly or indirectly.

Yes, if things were different there would be no perceivable shortage of priests. In fact, we would be able to eliminate the permanent diaconate again!

 

[SHEMP]

Women priests is and will always be impossible.

 

[STIOFAN]

Catholic29:

I would personally prefer the celibate state for Priests, and I’m certain God does as well. But is the discipline of celibacy so important as to allow parishes to close, with more Catholics having reduced access to the sacraments, as a result of not enough men being ordained?

I just heard on tv Sunday, that Anglicans can marry and their vocations are down, so why if they are allowed to get married are they not swamped with vocations ?
The problem of vocations goes deeper than that, vocations start in the family.
And one reason why JP2 was always concerned for the family, because if the family breaks down, then society reaps it.
Then some of the preaching where I go to isn’t exactly inspiring, I know we don’t want to frighten people about hell, but it hasn’t been mentioned for years in my parish.
If we don’t tell a child if they put their hand into the fire it will burn them, then they just might get burnt.
If we don’t remind them of hell, then they might just God forbid—end up there.

 

[Pariah_Pirana]

Trelow:

The lack of vocations is due to the lack of Catachesis, and the use of birth control, not the fact Latin Rite priests don’t get to marry.

Bingo. The lack of good catechesis has taken a horrible toll on the Church in the USA.

 

[Hesychios]

Bruised Reed:

One other question to add - do proponants of married priests realise that there is time and money involved with the preparation of the priest?

How much time do y’all think most men would be willing to take away from their families to study for the priesthood? Who’s going to support the family in the meantime?

Well gosh! I suppose we never thought of that!

To quote Chis-WA: We have a lack of priests because our country is full of luke-warm Catholics.

Being unwilling to pony up the dough, being unwilling to make the personal sacrifices. The Catholic faithful are basically luke-warm.

The same reasons we give for not trying a married option are the reasons we give for the shortage of celibate priests.

The solution to both is the same: if we weren’t luke-warm as a group, we would have more vocations and we would be more willing to support married priest candidates through the process.

We might as well face it, as fix said earlier: We get the number and quality of vocations we deserve.

 

[Bruised_Reed]

Hesychios:

Well gosh! I suppose we never thought of that!

…

Well, we probably did, but when the conversation gets going about this most people I’ve spoke with act as though it’s as simple as the Queen of England knighting someone. There isn’t an awareness of the practicalities.

And as Archbishop Elden Curtiss said “orthodoxy begets vocations.” I don’t think that the diocese of Arlington (VA) suddenly became lukewarm but there has been a decrease in vocations since Bishop Louverde came on board.

Oh, and Hesychios, you weren’t being snarky with me were you? I thought I got of wiff of sarcasm.

 

[caroljm36]

It may work for larger 1-pastor parishes, but my parish has 3 pastors and 2 deacons, so we get daily mass, regular confessions, 5 weekend masses, and all the holy days, plus funerals and weddings…how could we support the families for 3 pastors? Seems like there would have to be a rule that the associate be unmarried, and the in-residence pastor be an old guy.

But it’s not just the money. It’s the time they need to devote to their reading, prayer, homilies, counseling, at a time when women have HIGH expections of the husband’s family time. It seems also like it would put pressure on unmarried priests to get married, else look like SSA. What if a person wants to devote themselves to this kind of service? How could JPII or B16 ever have gained all the learning and pastoral experience they gained if they had had to raise families too? Personally I appreciate their philosophical brilliance and facility with languages. Sure you have secular & academics who are brilliant and learned too but often you learn later that their families really paid a price.

 

[Hesychios]

Bruised Reed:

Oh, and Hesychios, you weren’t being snarky with me were you? I thought I got of wiff of sarcasm.

Oh, I suppose I was.

The old snark-o-meter is out of adjustment.

I regret that I have been rude, I could have used better judgment.

Sorry.

+T+
Michael

 

[CatQuilt]

netmil(name removed by moderator):

I have often wondered about the actual figures on this.
At my parish, right now, we have 4 priests and 8 seminarians.
Are the “Priest Shortage” figures in the US overblown? (or are we just particularly blessed?)

Wow! What state do you live in? Let me guess, your parish/diocese is orthodox?!

 

[Bruised_Reed]

Hesychios:

Oh, I suppose I was.

The old snark-o-meter is out of adjustment.

I regret that I have been rude, I could have used better judgment.

Sorry.

+T+
Michael

I don’t mean to hijack the thread but I wanted to say thank you. It humbled me right quick. And I hope it’s okay to use this

I regret that I have been rude, I could have used better judgment. Sorry.

as a sort of script when I need to make an apology.

 

[Br.Rich_SFO]

btritone:

Priests used to be able to marry , why did it change?
i heard it was because the church was made liable to pay the spouse money if the priest got divorced.

Some priests were married in the early Church along with many that were not. Following on what St. Paul said in the 300’s it became generally accepted that priests would be celibate. As we moved towards the 800’s issues of inheritence, ownership of church property, and so on became common and the Church made it universal law. Celibacy was always an option and actually the most common choice, since most priests were members of Religious Orders.

 

[btritone]

Wouldn’t that be greedy and heartless for the church not to let these ex spouses get what they deserved(property inheritence etc.) if the divorce was the fault of the priest?,& isn’t that chauvanistic? People always say the bottom line with our church is the money thing and we are the richest church in the world and I cannot stand when people say this!!, but don’t we live up to this?

 

[Catholic29]

It appears there are as many opinions, and good insights and observations in this thread as there are posters, so I guess the question now would be who is right?

What we can be certain of is the we have X number of Priests staffing X number of parishes, which in turn serve X number of Catholics. And the reality on the ground in America is that overall the first X is declining in relation to the latter 2.

With more prayer, improving catechesis, increasing vocational promotion efforts and importing in as many seminarians from overseas as we can. Depending on how successful those efforts will be, I have resigned myself to the strong possibility that the Church may never find an effective solution to the vocational crisis effecting many dioceses and religious orders in America and elsewhere.

But in the meantime I do believe more parishes will have to be closed and with that more defections from the Catholic faith are inevitable, due to reduced Sacrament availability and disgust from lay Catholics with their hierarchy for suppressing their parishes, where many of them were baptized and married in along with numerous other fond family memories. All the while knowing that it may not of had to happen if it weren’t for one non-doctrinal discipline the bishops and the Holy See continue to cling to.

With much thought and prayer this is my honest assessment, in which you will either agree or disagree with.

God Bless