Talk:Priest shortage in the Catholic Church

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A further cause, which is frequently seen by analysts in surveys, is the fact that studied homosexual men have rarely chosen this occupation in the last 20-25 years in Western/Central Europe, electing instead to choose a different career path and find a life partner, and no longer using priesthood as a "hiding place."GLGerman 14:50, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

what analysts, which surveys? Freder1ck 15:17, 9 January 2007 (UTC)Freder1ck

South America

From the article: "The most prominent cause of priest shortages in South America is poverty." Does this mean that the poverty of the priests makes it an unattactive occupation, or that the poverty of the community makes it hard to train priests? -FZ 18:34, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

I would also like an explanation, because this article makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. Also, this article's subject matter would be better as a sub-section in the Roman Catholic Church article.216.184.125.233

Canon Law Restrictions

The code of Canon Law in the Catholic Church dictates who may and may not be trained as a priest. Anyone who does not meet the rules as laid down in the code will have to ask for an allowance from the Bishop or from Rome and in some rare cases from the Pope himself. There are many acts that are normal in everyday American society that will exclude a man from the priesthood. One of these in debt to a creditor such as owning a credit card. If a man converts to Catholicism and decides that he wants to be a priest and it is discovered that he has a child out of wedlock then he must wait until that child is of the age of majority for that country before the father may be trained to be a priest. In America, this means 18 years old. Some Bishops make an acception in cases where the child has already recieved the sacrament of confirmation as this is seen in the Church as reaching Adulthood. There are likely many men who would otherwise love to become priest if they could overcome some of these statutory restrictions.--Billiot 22:15, 15 July 2007 (UTC)

Having a child out of wedlock seems to be a very reasonable "statutory restriction" on becoming a priest! Re credit card: do you have a source? Scottwh (talk) 15:55, 6 October 2012 (UTC)

I don't know whether that's true with the credit card, but giving it back and waiting for the next monthly bill doesn't seem too hard anyway.--2001:A60:1516:F301:C89C:C713:DD82:8009 (talk) 19:49, 6 June 2014 (UTC)

Canon 285§4 says:

Without the permission of their ordinary, they are not to take on the management of goods belonging to lay persons or secular offices which entail an obligation of rendering accounts. They are prohibited from giving surety even with their own goods without consultation with their proper ordinary. They also are to refrain from signing promissory notes, namely, those through which they assume an obligation to make payment on demand.

That seems to me to prohibit holding a credit card, but if one is not in significant debt, it should be possible to close the card before being ordained. Argyriou (talk) 20:12, 2 February 2016 (UTC)

Its not about having a credit card. Canon 285 overall is about activities that are unbecoming of a priest. Code of Canon Law annotated p. 234, explains "those attached to financial responsibilities (such as the post of treasurer or administrator of goods belonging to laypeople, acting as trustee, signing promissary notes, etc.)" (see snippet) –BoBoMisiu (talk) 20:41, 2 February 2016 (UTC)

Yes, I'm pretty sure priests can hold credit cards, at least in the US. 8bitW (talk) 22:29, 2 February 2016 (UTC)

Homosexual people

Homosexual students in western european states go today a different way in life. They do not study any longer catholic theology. They are not afraid to live open gay/lesbian in Europe and they marry in their lifes. This was different before Stonewall and the liberalization in modern western european states. Many gay students became priests, so that no one asked them, why they don' t have a woman. GLGermann (talk) 10:27, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Today gay students study different disciplines at university or they study lutheran/protestant theology because then they can live an open life as protestant/lutheran priests. So that is one big reason, why the catholic church has great problems and priest shortage in Europe (Germany, Switzerland, Austria, ...). In german, switzerland or austrian lutheran or other protestant mainline churches gay couples can go to church after they married by state and get there a blessing as couple and lesbian/gay couples can live an open life in protestant/lutheran parishes.GLGermann (talk) 02:22, 18 January 2008 (UTC)

Merger

I suggest that either this article be merged with the article about the Catholic priesthood, or it be completely rewritten. Not to criticize any non-native speakers, but the English is a little hard to understand (run on sentences, etc.), and needs to be cleaned up significantly. Inquisitive89 (talk) 05:38, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

Also, there seem to be both overtly liberal and conservative voices vying to establish themselves in this article. A more neutral tone and POV throughout this article would greatly improve its accuracy. Inquisitive89 (talk) 05:58, 24 May 2008 (UTC)

I agree that this article should should be deleted. It's completely worthless and non-encyclopedic drivel, and dripping with POV. I've deleted the section titled "background" as it was horribly POV and amounted to little more than a commercial plug for the two books mentioned, both of which were fringe and not RS. The BBC article is also not a RS for this type of article, and it was misinterpreted to boot. I'm not convinced an article on this topic belongs in Wikipedia anyway. The material can be covered in another, already existing article, as you suggested Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 11:30, 1 June 2010 (UTC)

2014 now and this article is still terrible. I've tried to improve what I see as the most objective problems but I'd be in favour of deleting or merging it as well. --145.226.30.45 (talk) 17:07, 14 February 2014 (UTC)

Deleting Vatican figures

The statistics from the Vatican source really do not have anything to do with the topic of this article, and placing them here invites SYNTH. The figures cover very broad geographical areas (North and South America are considered together, for example), whereas priest shortages are a more local phenomenon. The Vatican figures also do not specify which percentage of the priests listed are active. In the US, for example, a very high percentage of priests are beyond retirement age. Furthermore, there is no link between the number of active priests and the number of faithful they are supposed to serve, nor between the rate of increase/decrease of the former with that of the latter.

In short, the figures simply shed no light whatsoever on the phenomenon of priest shortages. Statistics that would be useful would 1) cover individual countries, not continents; 2) take into account the percentage of active priests; and 3) relate the number of active priests with the number of faithful. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 18:19, 11 June 2011 (UTC)

Move

I came across this article and have moved to a more accurate title. Hope this does not offend anyone. Springnuts (talk) 20:54, 8 September 2012 (UTC)

A more accurate title still would be 'Priest shortage in the Roman Catholic Church in the United States', given that the majority of this article is about the state of the Church in America. It needs more information about priest shortages in other regions; I believe that, broadly speaking, there is also a priest shortage in the Church in Europe but not in Africa or Latin America, but I don't have any statistics to support that at the moment. Robofish (talk) 12:37, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

Actually, there is a severe priest shortage in Latin America, especially Brazil (because the priesthood is not an attractive option for Latin American males), and in Africa and Asia (because many priests and seminarians move to the US, and, unfortunately, it's disproportionately the best and brightest who do so).

According to NCR, "In the United States and Europe, the priest-to-baptized Catholic ratio today is 1 in 1,300; in Africa, it's almost 1 in 5,000; in Southeast Asia, it's 1 in 5,300; and in Latin America, it's a staggering 1 in 7,000." [[1]].

It's really a little more complicated, though, because in the US and Western Europe, a very high percentage of the total priests are retired and no longer active. This is especially true for native-born priests. Also, relatively few young Americans and Western Europeans become priests. A lot of the seminarians and new ordinands, especially younger ones, are from Africa and Asia.

Google -- ratio of priests to Catholics -- and you'll find lots of articles. Or read "International Priests in America: Challenges and Opportunities" by Dean R. Hoge and Aniedi Okure. It's available on Google Books. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 23:23, 14 March 2013 (UTC)

Inaccuracy

The number of Roman Catholics worldwide is no longer increasing

This version of the article didn't reflect the latest situation.

I haven't found information about the situation between about 1970 and 2008 but Roman Catholicism is not increasing worldwide now. Today there is growth only in Sub Saharan Africa. Has there been a dramatic change recently or were the figures for the time between about 1970 and 2008 propaganda/wishful thinking? This needs research.

Proxima Centauri (talk) 18:42, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

Frankly, any figures you will ever see are basically pulled out of a hat, and often peppered with a good dose of spin. Doing the research to obtain meaningful results is prohibitively expensive, especially on a global scale. Nobody is ever going to pay for that.

Most people go with the Vatican figures, not because they are any good, but because generally, they are the only figures available. Their numbers, though, are very suspect, most especially when it comes to Africa and Europe, where the tally is greatly exagerated.

Basically, the statement that "there are 1.1 billion Catholics" in the world" is meaningless because nobody has ever defined what a "Catholic" is. Without a workable operational definition, any "study" will just churn out gobbledeegook. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 19:30, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

I'll return tomorrow. Good luck trying to sort this article out. Proxima Centauri (talk) 19:46, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

It was horrible when I first found it. I cut out a lot of nonsense. Personally, I don't think the article should exist at all, because sufficient reliable sources will never be found to write a COMPREHENSIVE article on this topic. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 19:56, 16 April 2013 (UTC)

I put a {{delete}} template on, if nobody comes up with a strong case for keeping it, it should probably be deleted in a few days. Proxima Centauri (talk) 02:50, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

You used the speedy deletion template, which doesn't apply here. I've changed it to the proper PROD template. If it's challenged, AfD is the next step. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 07:22, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL. Phil Bridger (talk) 20:00, 20 April 2013 (UTC)

*An argument over numbers: how does the 1950s compare with today? This article suggests people within the RC Church made up data to pursue political goals. Proxima Centauri (talk) 09:03, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

The article in the Week cited at the head of this section provides no facts to support its assertion that the number of Catholics is decreasing. It gives a lot of anecdotal evidence, which is circumstantial, and has a polemical tone. To the point that figures are meaningless without a definition of what "Catholic" is, this is an obvious point, but one that has an answer: it's whoever the church says is Catholic. (Ditto for stats on priests.) Since they do publish official statistics in the Annuario Pontifico about who they consider their members to be, those numbers are suitable for inclusion in an encyclopaedia. That doesn't mean that they are above critique, but that critique would be better situated in a "Criticism" section of the Annuario's article. It's the same principle we would use if some demographer had a bone to pick about the census data on Vermont--if he had a reputable basis to criticise the data, it would be worth noting in a discussion of that data, but it wouldn't change what the official numbers are (unless the State re-issued its numbers). Anyway, this article (which shouldn't exist in the first place), is not the place for that discussion, I'd suggest adding a criticism section to the AP article if there's a basis for questioning the official numbers. --145.226.30.45 (talk) 17:18, 14 February 2014 (UTC)

Original research

The consequences section is almost entirely original research. The paragraph about lay people becoming involved is totally irrelevant and reflects neither the intent nor practice of Church. In fact the article itself states: "this is not a matter of deacons or lay ecclesial ministers taking over priestly roles, but of priests no longer taking over diaconal or lay roles." The shifting of these roles has nothing to do with a priest shortage and simply reflects a common misperception. Similarly, the section about celibacy is clearly not a consequence but the opposite--a cause. The rest has some valid points but is completely unsourced. As far as I can see, this section must be rewritten or taken out entirely. 8bitW (talk) 04:22, 2 February 2016 (UTC)

@8bitW: yes, it does look like the section needs to be rewritten the sources did not support the content from the time they were added, e.g. this edit. –BoBoMisiu (talk) 16:08, 2 February 2016 (UTC), modified 16:44, 2 February 2016 (UTC)

@BoBoMisiu: If you feel it is not supported by the sources, feel free to delete it. 8bitW (talk) 16:53, 2 February 2016 (UTC)

@8bitW: I'm still reading the sources. Nevertheless, other sources seem to be cherry picked from also, e.g. the 2005 Hoge lecture was the bases of his 2005 essay that is far more nuanced than the quote would suggest. –BoBoMisiu (talk) 16:58, 2 February 2016 (UTC)

I did some cleanup - that last paragraph just had to go. The rest will just take some wikignoming to make acceptable. Argyriou (talk) 19:59, 2 February 2016 (UTC)

Should there be a "causes" section? Hoge's paper and speech seem to be a useful starting point, but is there much more on why there are fewer men entering seminary? Also, I'm not sure the sections as they exist are useful - perhaps some other arrangement would be better? Argyriou (talk) 20:17, 2 February 2016 (UTC)

CARA figures are 2014

I read the captions. If you do it for one published year then do it for the rest but be consistent. I think the figures should be by date of publication since that is the latest date. Also, the world data and US data do not have the same collation date but do have the same publication year. In other words, I think the article should include based on the column headings in CARA tables. –BoBoMisiu (talk) 20:09, 11 February 2016 (UTC)