Except that all the delegates were men, and most of them gray-haired,
the professional meeting at Toronto's Westin Harbour Castle Hotel
looked like any other business conference. In between meetings,
delegates milled about sipping coffee, chatting with one another
or inspecting the wares of exhibitors selling items and services
of special interest to the profession: vestments, clerical garb,
hymnals. The theme of last April's annual meeting of the National
Federation of Priests' Councils (NFPC) was "evangelization," but
whenever two or more gathered during breaks the topic of conversation
inevitably turned to the ever-unraveling clerical sexual abuse/coverup
scandal.
In small knots of two and three between meetings and as a large
group at a closed-door session on the canon law rights of accused
priests, the men vented their emotions -- sadness for the victims
and the priests involved, anger at the perpetrators and bishops
who covered up, collective shame, fear of a witch hunt, and hope
that somehow, some way, something good might emerge.
This has not been an easy year to be a priest. Twelve months
ago no one could have predicted popular culture would paint the
priesthood as an object of derision and suspicion, that "Catholic
priest" would become the snickering punchline in Jay Leno's nightly
monologue. The priesthood has been wounded by the scandal. In
the aftermath, the institution has come under increasing scrutiny.
Questions have been raised about the selection, training and conduct
of priests. In the midst of all this are the priesthood's own
powerful demographic trends. As these trends progress, hastened
in part by the scandal, some believe a transformed church may
emerge, one which surely will be struggling with other issues.
* * *
Whenever a large group of priests gather, one demographic fact
dramatically asserts itself: American priests are old. It was
no accident that the NFPC assembly in Toronto, which included
the Canadian as well as U.S. branches of the organization, was
a sea of silver hair. The median age for the 46,041 U.S. Catholic
priests today is 60. That number inevitably will creep higher
as the priest population continues to grow older and the number
of newly ordained fails to keep pace with the number of priests
who die or resign.
At the current rate, in a decade the average priest will be
65 years of age. In contrast, the median age in 1970 was 47. This
is not a trivial concern. The older generation of priests shoulder
the lion's share of parish work. Realistically, they will be gone
sooner than later. And then what?
Seminarians are aging as well. A generation ago priestly study
often began in a high school "minor" seminary. Today's candidate
usually holds at least a bachelor's degree and often has several
years experience in another profession before entering the seminary.
Consequently, the average age of ordination has crept up to 36.
Twenty-something priests have become rarer in the church than
the Latin Mass. In fact, today more priests are above the age
of 90 than below the age of 30. The good news is that the newly
ordained bring more maturity and life experience to their ministry;
the bad news is they provide fewer years of service to the church.
Currently, fewer than 4,000 men are enrolled in seminaries in
the United States. The replacement rate is about 40 new priests
for every 100 who die or resign. Since the social turbulence of
the 1970s, ordinations have been falling 7 percent per decade.
The number of priests is likely to plummet even more as the scandal
takes its toll directly and indirectly. As of late August, 2002,
some 300 priests had been suspended from priestly duties this
year. That number is likely to grow as U.S. bishops implement
their national policy on clergy and child abuse.
Then there are the future priests who may be lost because of
the scandal. Rev. Donald Cozzens, former rector-president of Cleveland's
Saint Mary Seminary, says experience has shown a mentoring priest
is crucial to fostering vocations to the priesthood. In fact,
60 percent of the last ordination class reported that conversations
with a priest were instrumental in their decision to enter the
seminary. In the wake of the abuse scandals, will many priests
be wary of establishing recruiting relationships with young men?
Perhaps so. A survey of priests last spring found that 25 percent
said they were less inclined to encourage a young man to become
a priest.
Rev. Dan Mirsberger, a parish priest from the archdiocese of
Milwaukee, says he continues to talk to young men about the priesthood,
but he is somewhat discouraged. "I think the events of this past
year will have a negative effect on vocations," he says. "We pray
for vocations every day here, but I worry about who will follow
us."
Then, too, there is the difficult issue, which the scandal has
raised, of what to do -- if anything -- about gay seminarians.
A number of American bishops and Vatican officials, including
Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua of Philadelphia and Archbishop Tarcisio
Bertone, secretary of the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine
of the Faith, have argued that homosexuals, even if celibate,
are not fit to become priests. The Philadelphia archdiocesan seminary,
in fact, excludes gay candidates as a matter of policy.
If this automatic disqualification were to become churchwide
policy, it surely would have a negative effect on the number of
future priests in U.S. parishes. And what message would it send
to current gay priests who are faithful to their vows? Might such
a policy drive them out of the priesthood as well, with potentially
devastating results? In his 2000 book, The Changing Face of
the Priesthood, Father Cozzens says five studies suggest
that gays constitute anywhere from 30 to 50 percent of the priesthood.
Even if the numbers aren't that large, certainly there are significant
numbers of gay priests whose loss would have a major impact on
the church.
