Wednesday, October 12, 2011
The priest shortage
While we're on the subject of faith this topic came up recently in our parish because our parochial vicar was just reassigned upstate and now our pastor is running the parish all by himself basically and saying most of the Masses with only an occasional helping hand and btw the priest who was just sent upstate will be running that parish by himself too which seems to be the trend these days. In the latest bulletin our lone priest/pastor now gave statistics on the priest shortage, only one new priest ordained in the whole Archdiocese of New York in the month of May and he further gave the numbers on how many parishes in Westchester and surrounding counties are now being run by one priest. Suffice to say quite a few in fact but this begs the question as unfair as it may seem to him and others and make no mistake saying that many Masses is hard work but isn't this the marketplace in operation? The vast majority of men do not opt for the celibate lifestyle which is still a requirement for the Catholic priesthood so you can pray for vocations all you want and petition God on a weekly basis but that still won't change the marketplace or the reality. Of course for too many men these days who aren't even priests there is the depressing matter of involuntary celibacy, those existential drought periods of poor gas station porn and carpel-tunnel syndrome but even for these poor souls caught in the orbit of Outer Darkness sex or meeting someone or eventually falling in love is still a goal if not reached in this life then the next. Deliberate celibacy has always struck me as somehow going against Nature but be that as it may my pastor acts like a bunch of us men are supposed to just stop what we're doing after maybe a lengthy period of reflection and spiritual introspection and sign up to be priests. Ain't gonna work that way, there's too strong a pull in the opposite direction. Change the rules and you'll get more priests:)
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I see they have the ads
ReplyDelete..sort of like the Army recruiters.
Our church's newest associate priest had worked as a chemist for 15 years or so and then decided to become a priest later in life.
ReplyDeleteThe Council Trent made this interesting statement about celibacy:
ReplyDelete"If anyone says that it is not better and more godly to live in virginity or in the unmarried state than to marry, let him be anathema."
The celibacy imposed on priests was instituted to keep property withing the church after a member of the clergy died.
A majority of the 12 disciples were married. Jesus could have chosen all unmarried disciples, but chose married men to follow him and said absolutely nothing about celibacy being a requirement of his disciples.
Celibacy is a man-made rule.
"Contrary to what defenders might say, there is nothing whatsoever about the nature of the priesthood which makes celibacy necessary or essential. In the 1967 encyclical Sacerdotalis Caelibatus, written to reinforce the "Sacredness of Celibacy" in the face of growing calls to rethink it, Pope Paul VI explained that while celibacy is a "dazzling jewel," it is not:
...required by the nature of the priesthood itself. This is clear from the practice of the early church itself and the traditions of the Eastern churches."
There's a bit in the Bible somewhere, if I'm not mistaken something Paul wrote, about how a bishop should be the husband of only one wife.
ReplyDeleteBut religion has always been like this. People and groups choose those parts of the Bible they will and won't adhere to or follow. And anyway, the Vatican makes its own rules, which for the Catholic church supersede the Bible's.
"Change the rules and you'll get more priests."
ReplyDeleteThe RCC had the opportunity to do that and didn't.
The RCC made up the celibacy rules; the rules, over time, have caused a radical decline in priestly vocations; they refuse to go back to the original married priesthood standard.
There are men who I am sure are deeply spiritual but who won't become Catholic priests because of the celibacy requirement. Something Saty said awhile back about original Christianity I tend to agree with, much of what came later (i.e. Catholicism) had nothing whatsoever to do with what Jesus actually said. Anyway it's been tried and hasn't worked (celibacy), the marketplace has spoken. Now why doesn't God answer our weekly petitions for an increase in vocations? maybe because He respects the marketplace.
ReplyDelete"Now why doesn't God answer our weekly petitions for an increase in vocations?"
ReplyDeleteThis is an interesting question.
But as I remember my Catholic upbringing, we were taught that we all have free will. So my question to your question is how do people exercise their free will--for example, not to enter the celibate priesthood--when there are groups of Catholics that want God to intercede and override the free will of the men who choose not to enter the priesthood?
IOW, do you believe humans really have free will if you also believe God can intercede and override human choices??
It's interesting that the Catholic Church is still holding onto its celibacy rule even in the midst of this historic and severe priest shortage. Why not say it was a noble experiment, made sense at some point but we have to change course? I was seriously thinking the other day the time may come in the not too distant future when priests just peter out altogether and churches close down entirely. You know when I put my karmic hat on that could be justice for the clergy sex scandals of the past.
ReplyDelete