Not A Bunch of Unhappy Guys: Greeley on Modern Priests

Andrew Greeley has a new book out titled: Priests: A Calling in Crisis.

Commonweal has an excellent review of it.

Some excerpts:

"Most current priests, he claims, aren’t miserable as celibates, and they’re no more emotionally immature than most men. (Depending on your view of men generally, that’s reassuring.) It’s far from the case, he concludes, that “all the good ones leave.” Many priests still take pride in their work and find it rewarding, and the vast majority would choose the priesthood if they had it to do over again. Priests who leave, in Greeley’s often convincing interpretation of the data, are driven out not by the requirement of celibacy, but because they ultimately didn’t like the work."

His solution to the priest shortage?
"Greeley proposes something he’s suggested before: a “priest corps” of young ordained recruits who sign up for a ten-year hitch and then, at age thirty-something, decide whether to reenlist or retire with honor."

Read entire review.

Voting as Catholic: Some Perspectives

I'm not too worried that suddenly Catholics will be shunned in the Communion line because the priest suspects how they feel on abortion and gay rights. Bishop Michael Sheridan of Colorado made the news today because he said Catholics who vote for politicians who support abortion rights and gay marriage will be banned from Communion. See story.

I see Sheridan's stance as one more example of the heiracrchy trying to squeeze tight on a church in which the laity is getting too powerful. It's threatening. So they try some old tactics. This time, they won't work easily. Here are two reasons why:

The majority of priests and bishops won't buy into this nonsense. It goes against our right to vote as citizens in a private way. And many Eucharistic ministers are lay people due to the priest shortage. I would find it highly improbable that a Eucharistic minister would ever refuse someone Communion based on what they guess would be their voting record.

And besides, Catholics make up a huge bloc of voters and can't easily be categorized. So it would be difficult for a priest to even predict how a parishioner might vote. See article.

The Widsom of Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier is the French founder of L'Arche, a program of communities now around the world. "Core members" are people with disabilities who live in community with their caregivers in relationships of equality.

In a recent interview in The Tablet, Vanier shared his ideas on the origin of peace. It's beautiful reading in this time of great and disturbing war.

Here's an excerpt:
"Vanier draws a series of peace lessons from the L’Arche experience. Peace is not stasis; it is not the absence of violence: where there is isolation, separation and indifference between peoples, conflict can break out at any time. Nor is it simply civility and respect for the law, in which the walls of separation remain firm. Peace, rather, is the counter-dynamic to competition, rivalry and the clash of strengths. Peace can only come, he says, when the chain of violence is broken and the weaker members of society are fully welcomed, loved and respected. It is the conversion undergone by the Good Samaritan, who was first moved by generosity, then by compassion, then by amazement and joy. “Something must have happened”, says Vanier, “when the man woke up and saw he had been saved by an enemy, and says, ‘You’re my brother’!”

"The discovery of this brotherhood in humanity which is stronger and deeper than any social and religious identity is the place where peace becomes possible. Vanier believes too much interreligious dialogue begins with theology and spirituality – in a comparison of belief systems – and so gets nowhere. “You get to a point where you ask, ‘are Jesus and Muhammad the same’? Either you say yes or you say no. Better to ask together, ‘what does it mean to be a human being and how do human beings grow? What is freedom, what is human maturity’?” Religious beliefs can then be tackled later, says Vanier, after the discovery of a shared humanity and the mutual acceptance of the other."

Read entire article

Catholic Statistics

Well, there are a lot of us Catholics in the world.

Zenit news reported that "the number of Catholic faithful rose from 757 million in 1978 to 1.07 billion at year-end 2002. By continent, the increase was 150% in Africa; 74% in Asia; 49% in Oceania; 45% in the Americas; and 5% in Europe.

"Yet, the percentage of Catholics as a share of world population dropped. In 1978, 17.99% of the world's inhabitants were Catholic; in 1990, the tally was 17.68%; and in 2002, 17.2%."

See more statistics.

The No Communion Argument

If you're interested in the reasons church officials believe presidential candidate John Kerry shouldn't receive Communion, National Catholic Register has a fairly detailed and clearly written explanation.

Excerpt: "There is a moral dimension to politics just as there is a moral dimension to the economy, medicine, family life, and science. Christians cannot engage in business as if it were outside the realm of morality, any more than doctors can practice medicine without due regard for moral norms, and thus we have "business ethics" and "medical ethics" to help people of good will, and especially Christians, to live out these vocations according to the values and principles of the Gospel and right reason. "Political ethics" offers a no less important service to Christians who engage in public service for the good of society.

"Catholic politicians can no more check their faith at the door of Congress than Catholic businesspeople can conduct their affairs independently of Christian moral principles."

Read entire article.

Bishops for Candidate X?

The Catholic heirarchy is debating whether to sanction politicians who are pro-choice. Translation: No communion for Kerry. It makes some wonder if the heirarchy is pro-Bush then, even though Bush is gung ho on the death penalty and really hot for war, both issues that conflict with church teachings.

Well, John Allen of National Catholic Reporter says no, the bishops aren't necessarily for Bush, either.

Allen writes: "Cardinal Theodore McCarrick of Washington, who is leading a bishops' committee to study the possibility of sanctions against pro-choice politicians, has denied that this is part of a strategy on the part of the bishops to support the reelection of President George W. Bush.

"'Absolutely not,' McCarrick said in an exclusive April 28 interview with NCR in Rome."

Read article.