Liberal Dioceses

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THurifer2

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I went to this website catholic-hierarchy.org/diocese/doran.html

And I find it AMAZING in looking at the statistics tables of each diocese. More traditional Dioceses have a much much much better Catholic to priest ratio…some of the famously liberal dioceses have HORRIBLE ratios. If you look at some of the bishops you will notice that the preist to Catholic ratio turns south very soon after their installation. It isn’t always true but if you look at a few west coast archdioceses and dioceses some relatively well known Bishops and “ahem” Cardinals have done some pretty bad jobs attracting priests. Its pathetic.
 
I think it just goes to show that the only way for the Church to survive is to maintain the teachings as they always have been. Stray from tradition, and you lose your flock. God help them all.
 
I feel that disobedience to tradition is just one aspect. 😊 The main issue is that the clergy and bishops have all become inured to the rapid decline in the Church. This is not to let us off the hook, because we also lack holiness and zeal. Finally, we must understand it is Gods church and as long as God is God the church will continue. It is so easy to be fixated on faithfulness to tradition that we often do not realise what role we ourselves have played in this whole shortage of vocations.
Most catholics do not realise that they partake of the good works or lack of it from all the members of the Church as Fr Muller puts it "The better to understand this intimate union existing among the members of the Church, St. Paul compares the Church to the human body, in which there is only one head, but many limbs, senses, and members, which have all some office or duty to perform for the common good of the whole body. Thus, the hands work for the support of the body, the feet convey it from place to place, the eyes watch to guard it from danger, the stomach digests the food, and so of the rest. So is it in the Church of Christ. Whatever good any member does, profits not only himself, but every member of the Church to which he belongs. In this manner, the prayers and works of penance of many holy monks and nuns, and other virtuous Catholics throughout the world, obtain for us, their fellow-members, many graces and blessings from God, though we do not know at the time through whose prayers they come."
May God grant us his wisdom to sanctify ourselves and pray for our families.

Sorry for the long winded comment and going off on tangents.
 
While it’s interesting, I don’t think it demonstrates that phenomena consistanly.

Just looking at the Diocese of Arlington in VA, the numbers don’t change that significantly even with Loverde. Keating was very orthodox and was a huge supporter of the preisthood. Loverde, less so, and altar chicks are everywhere now.

The ratio is better in the very liberal diocese I live in now. The numbers change consistantly as the number of preists drop. It actually comes off quite good unless you consider the area it covers. Many of our priests cover more than one parish and drive an hour one way to get to their other parish. I don’t recall that happening in ARlington.

I would have expected the numbers to be quite different; I believe “orthodoxy begets vocations” (Archbishop Elden Curtiss). I think there was a similar table from Crisis magazine. I’ll try to find it if you are interested.
 
It is also telling to see how the liberal dioceses are the ones who have somehow been connected to some homosexual bishops such as Weakland.
cwnews.com/offtherecord/offtherecord.cfm?task=singledisplay&recnum=2791

It all goes to show that when you throw morality out and replace it with a feel good social justice system you lose focus that the focus should be on salvation, not feeling good.

When the focus of the turn back to the truth of Christ in spreading the message of Salvation and fidelity to truth then things will turn around. When the message is muddled up in seeking man’s will then scandal will continue and the Church wont stand for anything. Who want to be a priest when it means nothing?
This is the message progressives give young men.

In Christ
Scylla
 
Whether the diocese is liberal or conservative, the laity also play a role. When was the last time you asked a high school or college aged man if he had ever considered becoming a priest? Or said something like you could picture him at the altar celebrating Mass?

The first time I said that to someone I was afraid of a negative reaction. Instead he said that he had thought about it. I told him I would keep him in my prayers. I’ve said it to a number of guys since then and the reactions have always been positive.

I think it helps to encourage people in this direction. Knowing that they have a quality that is visible to others is important.
 
Teakafrog said:
Stray from tradition, and you lose your flock. God help them all.
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That would be a quote well worth memorizing and engraining in the minds of those who would desire to be leaders of any sort in the church.
 
SuscipeMeDomine said:
. When was the last time you asked a high school or college aged man if he had ever considered becoming a priest? Or said something like you could picture him at the altar celebrating Mass?
.
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At least weekly…and sometimes several times per week. Of course I am the chairperson for my parish vocations commission.😃
 
Bruised_Reed said:
I think there was a similar table from Crisis magazine. I’ll try to find it if you are interested.
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You may be referring to the first article here. Sorry, a direct link to the article didn’t seem to work.

I was a bit surprised when I looked through the Crisis piece - several people on these forums had been enthusiastically touting the Bishop of Lincoln as a shining example of what bishops ought to be. I expected Lincoln to be head and shoulders above most of the rest. But as I recall, it was fairly middle-of-the-pack among similar dioceses.

In the several other cases where I was familiar with the bisohp, abysmal diocesan health in some measurements seemed to be related much more closely to the overall liberality of the city or region rather than the liberality of the bishop, and inversely proportional to the number of immigrants.
 
The Lincoln Diocese and Nebraska for that matter is very good but is out numbered by protestant churches and schools in the area. The Catholic Churches are good and have good leadership. I am not suprised though that on an national scale Lincoln is where it is. Lincoln is viewed as very devot but far less catholic in terms of people than omaha.
 
In my experience, more liberal young men who are considering vocations tend to go to the various orders, while more conservative young men who are considering vocations go to diocesean priesthood. The more liberal priests, therefore, don’t remain in the diocese, but are most frequently found serving overseas, most often in the developing world. Even if they stay in their home country, though, chances are there will not be community house in their home diocese - so ‘religious priests’ (aren’t they all?🙂 ) will be clustered in particular places, not necessarily reflecting the conservative/liberal nature of the overall diocese.

The statistics, therefore, are not necessarily the best indicators of the state of vocations.
 
Digitonomy said:
You may be referring to the first article here. Sorry, a direct link to the article didn’t seem to work.

I was a bit surprised when I looked through the Crisis piece - several people on these forums had been enthusiastically touting the Bishop of Lincoln as a shining example of what bishops ought to be. I expected Lincoln to be head and shoulders above most of the rest. But as I recall, it was fairly middle-of-the-pack among similar dioceses.

In the several other cases where I was familiar with the bisohp, abysmal diocesan health in some measurements seemed to be related much more closely to the overall liberality of the city or region rather than the liberality of the bishop, and inversely proportional to the number of immigrants.
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I had also expected Lincoln to be higher up on the listings, but then again those rankings were very limited in what they could show. I also know of at least one case where the numbers didn’t at all reflect the situation on the ground.

As far as limitations go, the rankers tried to level the playing field among dioceses of different sizes by using percentages, but when you’re ranking people based on rate of change you’re bound to skew the numbers a bit. A letter to the editor in First Things pointed this out with the case of Anchorage, a diocese that managed to have the largest progress of any (jumping I believe over 100 slots) and doing this in no small part on the tails of its jump in ordinations percentage. How many priests did Anchorage have to ordain in 2005 to secure its high ranking in this category? One. Perhaps Anchorage really deserves the credit its ranking gives it, but the numbers were open to drastic percentage swings based on very little actual change.

Another vulnerability is that dioceses that have been abysmal and manage to creep up to pathetic actually fare better than those that perform consistently well. For instance, a diocese that had historically managed to meet 100% of a theoretical “need” for priests would probably not look as good with priests ordained as a percentage of its presbyterate when compared with a diocese that had managed to move from meeting 25% of the need to 45% - that diocese would still be in pretty bad shape in an important respect, but it’s great improvement would make it look more “successful” than a far healthier diocese in that regard.

The last observation I have is that I have lived in the diocese of Ft. Wayne-South Bend nearly all my life and was greatly surprised to see it ranked ca. 30 slots below the diocese of Belleville, in which I worked as a lay minister for over a year before returning to school in my home diocese. I’ve never seen anything to make me think of my home diocese and bishop as stellar, but despite a few bad apples you rarely hear heresy from the pulpit and the abuses of liturgy are relatively minor. There is priest shortage, but not of the sort that slaps you in the face. That run-of-the-mill diocese ranked 30 slots below Belleville, in which only the bishop’s cronies manage to garner assignments to a single parish, with 2 being the norm for coverage and a fair number of priests serving 3-4 parishes. I routinely heard dissent or outright heresy preached from the pulpit and liturgical abuses were far worse and more numerous. The laity are barely if at all catechized. The new (since 2005) bishop is working to fix things, but doesn’t have a personality that is going to be very effective. If that church in crisis can far outrank a struggling but basically healthy church, I know to take the rankings with a grain of salt.
 
Having been born and raised here, can anyone tell me if the Archdiocese of Chicago is considered by most to be a liberal or more orthodox diocese? I think our current Cardinal (Francis Cardinal George) is considered more orthodox than the previous (Joseph Cardinal Bernardin), but I am sure others out there know more about this than I.
 
KatieD said:
Having been born and raised here, can anyone tell me if the Archdiocese of Chicago is considered by most to be a liberal or more orthodox diocese? I think our current Cardinal (Francis Cardinal George) is considered more orthodox than the previous (Joseph Cardinal Bernardin), but I am sure others out there know more about this than I.
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Cdl. George is considered a pretty strong conservative intellectually, but even he will admit that he doesn’t quite have the courage to enforce this. So he does a good amount of protesting various actions but will seldom force someone to fix a problematic situation. Because of this it seems like only those with experience on the ground would be able to judge the diocese’s character.
 
Andreas_Hofer said:
Cdl. George is considered a pretty strong conservative intellectually, but even he will admit that he doesn’t quite have the courage to enforce this. So he does a good amount of protesting various actions but will seldom force someone to fix a problematic situation. Because of this it seems like only those with experience on the ground would be able to judge the diocese’s character.
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“On the ground” Chicago is all over the board. You have everything from St. John Cantius to St. Sabina, and all manner of people & places in between.
 
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