Part of Dr. Pickett's presentation was a 5-page handout containing what appeared to be screencaps from a 28 slide Power Point presentation. Some of these slides presented DOR's then-current projections out to as far as 2025 for such items as the number of priests and the number and type of parishes.
Packrat that I am, my copy of that handout is still in my files. As so, without further ado, here is the data Dr. Pickett presented 6+ years ago.
Of particular interest is the following chart from Page 2:
Pay particular attention to the projected number of priests in 2015. I make it out to be about 90 and I have to wonder, despite DOR's protestations to the contrary, whether this is the real driving force behind at least some of the more recent parish closures, as well as some of those now in the works.
7 comments:
It would be interesting to see current statistics. There has been a boom in priestly vocations recently in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. I believe that Guadelejara, Mexico has about a thousand seminarians.
There are at least 24 priests serving as pastors in Monroe County alone who were born before 1950. I'm referring to pastors, not "sacramental ministers," who tend to be as old if not older than priest pastors. Not a good sign. We could be down to ~25 active priests by the end of this decade if the trends continue.
There is one thing, however, that these charts do not appear to be taking into account; and that is a new bishop in 2012. A major change to one of the experimental variables could produce much different results than what we are expecting. The present leader and the environment in this diocese are vocation killers.
~Dr. K
The number of Monroe County pastors who were born after 1950 (incl. those whose date of birth I was unable to find) is 21. Important to note that a lot of these priests were born between 1950-53. Thus, we could be in major trouble by the year 2025.
We have the same problem in the Diocese of Springfield, MA. Parishes that are financially viable and have decent attendance are being closed because there are no priests to serve them. It's very sad.
The DOR announced today the plan to close and sell the largest Church in the diocese, St. Thomas the Apostle Church, Irondequoit. This Church can easily seat 1000 people. One Priest to 1000 Mass attendees!
Is the DOR really concerned about their priest shortage?
Mike, I sometimes wonder the same thing. But then, I look at which parishes are being closed, what's being built, which books the bishop writes, etc. It's deliberate. It must be. You don't close a place like St Thomas if you're worried about a priest shortage. You close a place like St Thomas if you fundamentally loathe Tradition (and tradition). You also make sure someone like Fr. Antinarelli is never appointed a pastor anywhere so that he has no canonical rights--that way, you can exert some level of control over him. Notice where dissenting priests and loyal priests are placed. I think it's fairly clear that H.E. Bp. Clark is trying to ensure that the local church does not have a great resurgence in the years after he retires. It wouldn't look good for the legacy
Note also how Fr. Bonsignore and Fr. Colacino are not pastors of any parish. This is not a coincidence.
~Dr. K
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