JACK OF ALL TRADES - MASTER OF FEW

“I’m starting to get a taste of what’s involved with being a pastor.”

This was a line from a newly ordained priest for the Diocese of Cleveland.  He had visited St. Sebastian on Monday night to talk to our confirmation candidates, their parents, and sponsors about being on fire for God.  Afterward in the rectory he made that comment about being a pastor.  He was “Home Alone,” his pastor being on his annual retreat.  “I’m not running the parish,” he was quick to clarify, “but I’m discovering there is a lot more to it than I originally imagined.”

Besides being an “expert” (as much as anybody is) on matters of faith, God, and people’s souls, there are budgets and roofs and counseling.  Art, education, tax laws, city ordinances, Increasing federal laws, and being able to play the politician (you can’t say yes to everything but try to keep people involved and happy) and more are all nuances of a pastor.

 
“I had to say, ‘No,’ to someone today,” he said.  “Gosh was that difficult.  It was something that the person really wanted and I knew the pastor (who was away) didn’t.  I had to find a way to say no without getting this very enthusiastic person upset.”  It is a very difficult thing.

That was an interesting lesson to learn for such a recently ordained priest.  

Then the next morning tragedy struck his parish.  One of the school children had died.  Pulled away from Mass, he had to run out to scene to pray and comfort.  But Mass could not be left unfinished and so he had to returned to finish Mass after witnessing this as duty called him to do.  But things would not end there.  This is something with which they will be dealing for a long time.  

Fortunately the pastor was able to hurry home and assist with his wizened and time tested years dealing with all kinds of things and together, along with a wonderful, faith filled community, they began the process of coping and healing.

This weekend is Priesthood Sunday.  Imagine how different things would have been if there was not a priest on hand at the parish that morning - if there were not someone living at the parish that could handle emergencies around the clock - if there were not someone free of familial obligations so as to be able to be that representative of Christ (however imperfectly we do so) whenever and for as long as needed.  Please pray for vocations.  Suggest to a young man that you think he might make a good priest.  Be a part of the solution of making sure our Catholic community is well tended in the future.

LOOKS LIKE WE MADE IT

At the end of last month fifteen years ago on what used to be St. Joan of Arc day, four of my classmates and I were ordained to the priesthood.  We got together for dinner and to talk – mostly about how quickly 15 years have zoomed by.  Coming out of a time in the diocese when it was unheard of that anybody would be considered pastor material until at least age 55, we thought about where we were not having quite encroached upon that age yet.  One of us works down town at the chancery, two of us are pastors, one of us is a parochial vicar in one of the largest parishes in the diocese, and our fifth member, who was unable to join us, is serving as a missionary in our sister diocese of El Salvador. 

 

As great at this sounds (and we are all very grateful for our assignments) this is clarion call that we need to do a better job of promoting vocations.  We are where we are because the ranks are thinning.  There is so much good to be done.  There are so many people to help.  There are so many truths to be told.  There are so many sacraments to be celebrated.  There are so many lives to be touched.  And we look at each other across the table and think, “I can’t believe more guys don’t want to do this.”

 

There may be particular tasks that I don’t want to do, but by and large, I can’t think of anything that I could do that would be as fulfilling as being a priest.  I am a later vocation and worked at various things which I loved, but none of them tops this.

 

I had every intention of being kicked out of the seminary.  Priesthood was just number one on my list, but the list was long and if they didn’t want me, I would just move on to the next thing.  (Many think once you go into the seminary that’s it!  You are going to be a priest.  But in reality it is a place of discernment a little bit like going to school to be a doctor and determining – on both sides of the teacher’s desk – if you’ve got what it takes.)  But surprise!  I made it!  How fortunate fate has been. 

 

What helped me on my journey is a history of happy single persons in my family and so celibacy was not such a big, scary factor.  (And now people seem to be afraid of marriage too!)  I wish people would discern better if they are cut for marriage (or even desire it) to the same extent we wish people would discern priesthood. 

 

But truly, in the end it isn’t about us discerning what we want, but how we can best serve God and then looking for that vocation in life that best fits that calling. 

A TALE OF TWO CHURCHES: THE PRIEST SHORTAGE

Ask anybody and they will tell you that there is a priest shortage.  But as with so many things, we hear this so often that we do not think to question if it is, in fact, true.  What follows is simply asking that this assumption, which seems so true, be reexamined.  It is not a scientific study, just some observations and I invite you to expand upon it.

The benchmark for what the Church should look like for us in the United States is the 1950s.  Convents and abbeys were bursting at the seams.  Even smaller parishes which today might not merit a priest on its own may have had two.  But is this the norm?  Was it ever?  Were the 1950s an anomaly? 

The United States was considered mission territory until the 1920s.  Until about 1845 Catholics were a very small minority in here.  They tended to be English and well established.  From this point, especially with the Irish coming to the United States, Catholics quickly became (and remain) the single largest denomination spanning all classes of society.

As you can imagine this becomes a huge increase in a population that needs to be ministered to by priests.  Then throw into this mix those coming from other nations with different language needs and the whole situation in the United States becomes challenging.

Those coming over even from Catholic nations did not necessarily have priests falling all over themselves trying to minister to them in their native lands.  There were places that this was the case but not for all of them.  I take my family, particularly my father’s family, who rarely attended Mass save for very special days.  This was simply the way they experienced Church in Europe.  Until relatively recent times with improved roads and a better economy the priest only visited the village once every few months.  They did not have a full time priest.

My home parish did not have a permanent pastor at its founding in 1914.  This was not all that unusual particularly with the ethnic parishes.  There were simply not enough priests to go around.  They spent many years as a sort of mission parish with visiting priests from nearby parishes. 

In the 1950s a Gallop pole estimated that three out of every four Catholics attended Mass.  Let us suppose for a moment that this number remains true through 1965.  Here is where we get into it.  I invite people to check my math – a subject I have always liked but have never been good at.

According to this site, in 1965 there were 45.6 million Catholics in the United States.  At the same time there were 58,632 priests.  If we consider that only three quarters of those who were Catholic went to Mass, that means that there was approximately 1 priest for every 584 practicing Catholics.  (Gads, I hope my math is correct.)

Now, in 2011 there is a huge uptick in those who are Catholic in the United States.  According to the same source there are 65.4 million Catholics here.  But the number of priests has dropped to only 39,466.  But there has also been a dramatic drop in the number of people who attend Mass on a regular basis – perhaps as little as one quarter.  So, if we divide the number of current Catholics by 4 and then divide that number by the number or priests that we have, it comes out to about 414 people per priest.  If my reckoning is correct, we actually have a better priest to parishioner ratio. 

 

Of course the next question would be are fewer priest leading fewer people to come to Mass or are fewer people coming to Mass leading to fewer priests?  What is a good ratio?  Perhaps we are there and just do not realize it.  But if this is so why might it not feel like it?

There are a number of possible reasons for this.  The first may be the distribution of priests.  There are areas of concentration where there are simply more priests.  There are some diocese that produce more priests for service to their people.  This will throw the ratio off for such a large place as the United States.  Inside a diocese the distribution of people can set this off also.  Maintaining many parishes in an area with a diminishing Catholic presence will make staffing more and larger parishes in the suburbs more difficult.  This is the question of equitable distribution.

Lastly is the idea of what we expect a parish and subsequently a priest to do.  The main tasks of a parish is to perform sacraments and to teach.  If that is all we did we would be successful parishes.  But in the United States we are expected to do much, much more.  A parish responsible for all sorts of social programs, outreach, sports, arts, and scores of programs that make priests visiting our nation raise their eyebrows.  “You do all that?”  How did we get there?  There are two factors.  The first is the ethnic parish that became the center of their communities and tried to provide for their people all the things that society wouldn’t or couldn’t.  The second influence is the Protestant church that provides all kinds of services in order to attract worshipers.  The simple Catholic parish saw all this and thought that it had better get on the ball and so started expanding the area of services that it provides.

Life has also become more complicated.  The amount of work that is necessitated by government regulations, diocesan mandates, and good business practices require an enormous amount of time not previously needed.  For example a parish can no longer just let a volunteer or the parochial vicar run a youth group.  Today, priests and volunteers alike must spend time taking classes in how to be around children, have background checks, and participate in continuing updates.  Coordinating volunteers so that there are always two people present is a must.  There must be files constantly updated for all volunteers that show they are compliant, recruiting of volunteers and sending them off for classes and so forth.  And this is just one aspect of one area.  All this takes priests away from ministry.

So is there a priest shortage?  Maybe.  Is there a poor use of resources?  Maybe.  Have we lost sight of our mission?  Maybe.  Is it that we just expect more?  Maybe.  Or it could be a combination of all.  I’m not saying stop worrying – worry.  If we want to keep doing what we are doing – we need more priests.  But if the numbers above are true, does it not seem God is taking care of us even when we don’t see it?