Shortage of priests

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A shortage of priests is defined as the situation of an insufficient number of priests for the spiritual and pastoral needs of a certain area .

Situation in the Roman Catholic Church

The number of priests in the Roman Catholic Church has decreased in absolute terms in the last decades of the 20th century, it has increased again slightly since 2000. In 1978 there were 416,329 priests, in 2001 there were 405,067 diocesan and religious priests in the Roman Catholic Church worldwide, according to the Congregation for the Clergy , in 2017 there were 414,582 according to the 2019 papal yearbook. At the same time, the number of permanent deacons rose to 46,312.

A more meaningful indicator for assessing pastoral care is the number of parishioners cared for by a priest. Worldwide, the number of Catholics per priest doubled between 1969 and 2008 from 1,428 to 2,849 and rose further to 3,167 by 2017. The situation is very different depending on the continents: In Europe, the absolute number of priests is falling significantly, but is still the highest in the world with one priest per 1,617 Catholics. In Asia the ratio is 1: 2,172, in Africa 1: 5,051 and in South America 1: 7,200. No distinction is made between active and retired priests.

Situation in individual countries

Germany

In Germany , the number of priests fell from 19,707 to 12,983 in the period 1990–2019, of which 8,323 were in active service and 6,460 in pastoral care.

The number of Catholics per priest in Germany rose from 992 to 1,711 between 1969 and 2019. The number of Catholics per active pastor is 3498. The number of new priests who have been trained in the seminaries of the 27 German dioceses has declined continuously over the past decades and has been less than 100 per year since 2008.

year 1962 1970 1980 1990 2000 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019
priest 26,089 25,063 19,707 17.129 15,527 15,367 15,136 14,847 14,636 14,490 14,404 14,087 13,856 13,560 13,285 12,983
New priest
without medal 		557 303 211 295 154 93 99 81 86 76 98 75 58 77 74 60 55

Austria

In Austria , the number of priests fell from 6,238 in 1961 to 4,478 in 2001 to 3,693 in 2014. The number of members per priest rose from 980 (1961) to 1,343 (2001) to 1,411 (2014). The decline in priest numbers in Austria led in 2011 to the decision of the Austrian dioceses Seminaries merge. The seminaries in Austria are amalgamated as follows:

  • St. Pölten, Eisenstadt (Burgenland) and Vienna: main location in Vienna
  • Linz, Innsbruck and Feldkirch: main location in Innsbruck
  • Salzburg (initially on its own)
  • Graz and Klagenfurt.

In 2018 there were 17 priestly ordinations in Austria, in 2015 there were 22. The pastor's initiative shows the aging in the diocese of Innsbruck : in 2011 the average age of active priests was 63 years. In the deanery of Lienz, with 19 parishes and 5 pastoral care offices, four of the 17 active priests are under 60, seven under 75 and six are 75 and over.

Switzerland

In Switzerland (1961–2001) the number of priests fell from 4,492 to 3,091. The number of members per priest rose from 519 to 1,017 during this period.

Italy

In Italy the number of priests in 2012 was around 48,000, the highest number for any country in the world. A decrease to 34,810 is reported for 2016. The number of members per priest was around 1500.

France

The number of priests in France fell from around 38,300 in 1980 to around 14,786 in 2017 and has thus more than halved. The median age is 75, which means that half of the active priests are 75 years of age or older.
Priestly ordinations in recent years (partly rounded values):

year 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018
New priest 130 140 120 64 85 79 99

Netherlands

The number of priests in the Netherlands fell from 799 to 508 between 2003 and 2016. The number of church members per priest is 7543.

Rest of Europe

Pope Benedict XVI in a speech on September 11, 2006, deplored the condition of the shortage of priests. However, some clergymen put the numbers in Central Europe into perspective, since the overall Church in the affected areas is shrinking faster than the number of priests. Tarcisio Cardinal Bertone , State Secretary of the Pope, replied to a letter from Austrian clergy that the decline in the number of priests in Austria was closely related to the decline in practicing Catholics and that even fewer practicing Catholics would probably find a priest in Austria today than in earlier times Decades. The chairman of the German Bishops' Conference, Archbishop Robert Zollitsch , said in an interview with the Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger that, based on the number of young people attending church services, there are even more candidates for priesthood today than before.

Brazil

In 2013, the country where most Catholics live, there were 20,701 priests for around 125 million Catholics. Every priest has to look after over 6,000 believers, more than twice as many as the world average. In 2012, there were 547 ordinations in Brazil.

Mexico

In 1980, the country with the largest number of Catholics after Brazil had 10,087 priests for around 63 million Catholics. In 2013 there were 16,688 priests for around 97 million Catholics. Each priest has to look after around 6,000 believers, twice as many as the world average. In Mexico in 2013 357 world priests were ordained.

Philippines

In the Philippines there were 9040 priests for about 76 million Catholics in 2013. Each priest looks after around 8,000 believers.

United States

Evolution of the Numbers of Priests and Catholics in the United States

In the United States, the number of priests decreased from 59,192 to 35,929 from 1970 to 2018. In 2016, 3,552 parishes had no priests of their own. The number of Catholics per priest rose from 827 in 1965 to around 2000 in 2018.

Possible causes

The possible causes for the shortage of priests in the Roman Catholic Church vary according to the circumstances of the affected areas and possible solutions are discussed within the Church.

secularization

The increasing secularization in western industrialized countries leads to a smaller number of professing believers. If the number of those who choose the priesthood decreases even faster than the spiritual needs of the laity , there is a shortage of priests.

The Jesuit and sociologist Jan Kerkhof sees a cause in a changed family structure in Roman Catholic families with fewer children, who at the same time could find more opportunities to develop in civil life, which prevents parents from encouraging one of their sons to decide for the priestly profession. Former run-up organizations such as the Catholic youth associations and scouts no longer had an advertising function for the next generation of priests.

Celibacy obligation

According to a Jesuit magazine, 5,380 priests resigned from office due to a partnership between 2000 and 2004. Of 69,000 priests who have married in the past 40 years, 11,200 have regretted this step and have returned to the priestly service after a separation or after the death of their partner.

Reforms

Theologians like Hans Küng see a “reform backlog” in the Catholic Church as a cause which slows down the motivation to become a priest and thus leads to a shortage of priests. Questions of celibacy , the ordination of women and an interdenominational Eucharistic celebration are named as areas in which reforms are necessary but are "blocked by Rome". Still other theologians see the reforms in liturgy, teaching and piety that have taken place since the Second Vatican Council as a reason for a lack of young people in the diocesan seminaries. The disappearance of the old-style parishes in favor of large pastoral spaces and the resulting changes in the way of life and workload of the secular priests also contribute to the fact that there are either no offspring in the seminars or that seminarians drop out of pastoral training. Growing pastoral care units allowed less and less pastoral care.

Effects

The shortage of priests usually leads to less sacramental and pastoral care for the faithful in a given area. In this, circumstances may arise that were previously only known in diaspora areas. For the pastors, this means that the journeys for them are getting longer and longer and that they have less time for the individual believers, especially if they are now responsible for a larger number of believers. At the same time, however, the ratio of priests to parishioners who are cared for on a daily basis has increased significantly in some areas.

In Germany and many other Western European countries, the number of priests has decreased over the past two decades. Because of the shortage of priests in the German dioceses, parish associations are now being formed . In addition, more and more priests from other countries, especially from Poland , India and third world countries, are deployed in Germany.

In the United States, the Archbishop of Boston, Seán Patrick Cardinal O'Malley , cited the shortage of priests as the reason for the closure of dozen of wards in 2004, including five wards where believers have occupied the church to protest the closings.

In third world countries, especially in Latin America , however, is proselytizing weakened due to the shortage of priests. By the mid-1980s, Protestant pastors, especially Pentecostals in Brazil , had outnumbered Catholic priests; Protestants currently have twice as many pastors in Brazil.

Opposing developments

Partly contrary to the general trend, the offspring is developing in the traditionalist priestly communities, such as the Society of St. Peter , the Institute of Christ the King and High Priest and others. In 2010, these communities, which were assigned to the Pontifical Commission Ecclesia Dei , comprised a total of around 370 priests; the number of seminarians was about 300.

Proposals to reduce the shortage of priests

The pastoral theologian Paul Zulehner and Bishop Fritz Lobinger describe three commonly proposed solutions to reduce the shortage of priests. They describe the “traditional” proposed solution as the call for increased prayer for spiritual vocations, the intensification of vocational pastoral care and promotion of church professions and the sending of priests from well-supplied areas to areas of shortage. In “pragmatic” solution models, lay people and deacons take over the priests' tasks; In addition, the size of the pastoral care units is adapted to the number of priests. “Reformist” approaches propose the enlargement of the group of people available for the priestly profession through changed framework conditions; The usual recommendations are to change the formation of priests, allow women to be ordained and abolish the obligation of celibacy for clerics . Zulehner and Lobinger supplement these three solutions with a fourth way, in that, in addition to the celibate, academically educated “Paul priest” with missionary and pastoral duties, they provide the “Corinth priest”, whose tasks are primarily the church leadership and who is allowed to be married.

The dogmatic professor Michael Seewald suggested that celibate women be admitted to priestly ordination.

In order to relieve the pastors of administrative work, the German dioceses are increasingly hiring administrative managers (also known as coordinators, navigators or similar) across the board. They work at the pastor's office and are assigned to him. In the Archdiocese of Cologne, for example, there is to be an administrative management in all 180 pastoral areas by 2021.

As early as 1975, the Joint Synod of the Dioceses of the Federal Republic of Germany ( Würzburg Synod ) demanded that priests who have resigned from office because of marriage should be offered service in all church professions that are also open to lay people.

Reform-oriented associations within the Roman Catholic Church such as the Synod of the Lucerne Cantonal Church , lay initiatives such as the Church from Below Initiative , journalists critical of the Church, politicians such as Doris Leuthard and theologians such as Eugen Drewermann propose above all two solutions to remedy the shortage of priests: the abolition of celibacy and the ordination of women to priests.

At the Synod of Bishops on the Amazon - New Paths for the Church and a Holistic Ecology ( Amazon Synod ) in October 2019, 128 bishops with 41 votes against, voted in favor of recommending that the responsible ecclesiastical authorities also admit deacons to priestly ordination in the Amazon region . if they have already started a family before being ordained a deacon. Such a decision is intended to ensure pastoral care and the celebration of the Eucharist in communities that are particularly suffering from a shortage of priests. In his post-synodal apostolic letter Querida Amazonia , Pope Francis did not take up these suggestions; instead he expressed, among other things, the wish for a multiplication of the permanent deacons in the Amazon region.

As there are large regional variations in the number of vocations, some suggest sending priests from regions less affected by the shortage of priests to regions with fewer priests per believer. About a hundred years ago, Africa did not have a single indigenous priest. In some African countries, however, the situation has been completely reversed in recent decades. In Nigeria, for example, there are so many priests that the bishops there have decided to share this wealth with other African countries. Priests are sent to South Africa and Chad to support the church there. A missionary society of its own has even been founded, with members providing pastoral care to black Catholics living in the United States.

Almost 1,400 of the total of 12,571 active priests in Germany came from abroad in 2001, most of them from Poland (around 470) and India .

Situation in non-Roman Catholic churches

Lack of pastors in the Protestant churches

There is a lack of pastors in the Evangelical Church in Germany . The number of full-time theology students is currently falling sharply. While in 1992/93 there were still 7,800 Protestant theology students registered as candidates, the number in 2011/12 was only 2,400. The EKD plans to reduce the number of parish posts across Germany from around 24,500 today to 16,500 by 2030.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bavaria has around 1,700 positions, of which around 250 are vacant. Of the once four seminars in Bavaria in Nuremberg, Bayreuth, Neuendettelsau and Munich-Pasing, there is now only the Nuremberg Preachers' Seminar .

The Church President Volker Jung sees a “tight situation” for the Evangelical Church in Hesse and Nassau in terms of the number of pastors from 2017. A wave of retirement will peak from 2020. The Oberkirchenrat Joachim Ochel in the church office of the EKD warns of a false alarm in this context, but also admits that there could be a shortage of evangelical pastors from 2020.

In the Evangelical Church of the Palatinate , half of the clergy will retire between 2017 and 2027. According to the information provided by the personnel officer, the Palatinate is urgently looking for young theologians. A church district in the Palatinate is thinking about reducing the number of church services due to the fewer active pastors. In addition, artists, writers and musicians should also be invited to plan and conduct church services.

The Evangelical Reformed Churches in Switzerland assume that numerous retirements will be due in the next few years and that some of these pastoral positions cannot be filled with the current number of Protestant theology students. Various cantons want to counteract the acute shortage of pastors threatening from 2020, for example by enabling lateral entrants to find their way to the pastor's office.

There could also be a shortage of pastors in the Evangelical Church AB in Austria in the next few years. On the one hand there is a lack of young pastors, on the other hand, fewer and fewer Protestant pastors from Germany come to Austria. The press spokeswoman of the Evangelical Superintendentur AB Steiermark confirms this trend that it is “no longer so attractive” for German pastors to come to Austria. For this reason, there is increasing emphasis on the cooperation of lecturers .

Other churches

In the Old Catholic Churches the problem arises less from the insufficient number of priests who are supposed to look after a certain number of believers, but rather from the diaspora situation . Access by former Roman Catholic clergymen in recent years has been able to guarantee that the number of priests has remained sufficient even with fewer candidates for priesthood from their own church.

In the case of the Anglican churches , the issue also plays no role in the traditional core countries of Anglicanism. The same applies to the issue of shortage of priests in Orthodox churches . In earlier centuries a shortage of priests in the Anglican Church was a reason for the emergence of the Methodist Episcopal Church , particularly in the North American colonies of Great Britain.

literature

  • Dean R. Hoge: The First Five Years of the Priesthood: A Study of Newly Ordained Catholic Priests . Liturgical Press, Collegeville, Minnesota 2002.
  • Richard Sipe : Celibacy in Crisis: A Secret World Revisited . Brunner-Routledge, New York and Hove 2003.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Surprising rays of light , domradio June 14, 2018
  2. ↑ a b http://www.fides.org/de/stats/64944-VATIKAN_STATISTIKEN_DER_KATHOLISCHEN_KIRCHE_2018
  3. ^ Congregation for the Clergy: Clergy Total Numbers (French), accessed April 13, 2007
  4. ↑ The number of Catholics worldwide is increasing, accessed October 10, 2008
  5. ↑ Church statistics 2019
  6. ↑ Church statistics 2018
  7. ↑ a b Key data on church life 2017, accessed on July 27, 2018
  8. ↑ German Bishops' Conference: Flyer Key Data Church Statistics 2016
  9. ↑ Facts and Figures 2013/14 (PDF), accessed on July 30, 2014
  10. ↑ a b Facts and Figures 2014/15 ( Memento from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF), accessed on July 20, 2015
  11. ↑ Facts and Figures 2015/16 (PDF), accessed on August 10, 2016
  12. ↑ - Church Statistics, New Priest ( Memento from September 6, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) (PDF; 32 kB), accessed on October 7, 2013
  13. ^ Ordained priests 1962-2018
  14. ↑ a b c Congregation for the Clergy: Priests - Numbers for the Individual Continents and Nations (French), accessed April 13, 2007
  15. ^ Online portal of the Catholic Church in Austria , accessed on November 10, 2013
  16. ↑ a b Church statistics
  17. ↑ Die Presse: Dioceses combine training for priests
  18. ↑ Dean Franz Neuner, Dean Bernhard Kranebitter: Statistics: pfarrerinitiative-dioezese-innsbruck.blogspot.com, November 6, 2011
  19. ^ Congregation for the Clergy: Priests - Number of Believers Entrusted to Their Pastoral Care (French), accessed April 13, 2007
  20. ↑ CARA blog
  21. ^ Church in distress: 8000 pastors missing, La Stampa, November 25, 2017
  22. ^ Statistics of the French Bishops' Conference , accessed on July 23, 2015.
  23. ↑ a b Le Figaro 2.7. 2015 , accessed July 6, 2016.
  24. ↑ http://religions.blogs.ouest-france.fr/archive/2013/06/24/une-eglise-sans-pretres.html
  25. ^ French bishops' conference
  26. ↑ FAZ.net August 2, 2016 / Michaela Wiegel : Only briefly united in horror
  27. ↑ http://www.lefigaro.fr/actualite-france/2012/06/28/01016-20120628ARTFIG00678-l-eglise-face-a-la-penurie-des-pretres.php last accessed on September 19, 2012
  28. ^ French bishops' conference
  29. ↑ Church data
  30. ↑ Benedict XVI. : Sermon at the Marian Vespers with the religious and seminarians of Bavaria in Altötting , September 11, 2006
  31. ^ Official Journal for the Diocese of Regensburg No. 7, July 28, 2008, ZDB -ID 505981-1
  32. ↑ Zollitsch: Celibacy is not to blame for the lack of priests, called on October 10, 2008
  33. ↑ a b The Catholic Church in Brazil , accessed June 12, 2014.
  34. ↑ a b c CARA blog February 2016 , accessed on April 18, 2016.
  35. ↑ Manila Standard August 14, 2013 , accessed July 8, 2016.
  36. ↑ a b c Frequently requested Church Statistics
  37. ↑ a b Christ in the Present: A Shortage of Priests Passed On ( Memento of August 20, 2007 in the Internet Archive ), No. 42/2002, accessed on April 13, 2007
  38. ↑ Leo Auf der Maur: Pastoral care emergency in Switzerland - Viri probati and “lack of priests”: a future-oriented model of thought ( Memento of September 28, 2007 in the Internet Archive ), August 30, 2005
  39. ↑ a b Philip Jenkins: Demographic Development of Christians Worldwide: Effects on the New Evangelization (Lecture at the Mission Congress 2006) in Working Aids 202, from page 119 (PDF; 1.5 MB), May 2, 2006
  40. ^ Baby Johannessen: The shortage of priests is increasing in Europe , St. Olav , Catholic magazine for religion and culture, No. 1–2 / 1998. “In the past, most Catholic families had many children and always had someone they could 'spare' for a vocation. The priestly profession was also seen as a way of life for many young men. Catholic spouses [...] have only had one or two children for a long time. It takes a lot to create space for a vocation. "
  41. ↑ 69,000 Catholic priests got married . In: NZZ , April 20, 2007
  42. ↑ Commentary on a dispute between Cardinal Karl Lehmann and Hans Küng ( Memento from September 28, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
  43. ^ Example Sunday masses in Göttingen: 1960 18 masses with 11,000, 1989 24 masses with 2,900 believers. Source: Monsignore Nikolaus Wyrwoll in Stadtanzeiger Wunstorf from August 15, 2002, p. 30
  44. ↑ Catholic Church: Married priests: Archbishop cautious - ORF
  45. ↑ Abby Goodnough, "In Quiet Rebellion, Parishioners Keep the Faith". In: New York Times , January 5, 2009
  46. ↑ 370 priests, hundreds of thousands of believers . On: www.kath.net from May 13, 2010; Retrieved May 11, 2011.
  47. ↑ Michael Seewald, Celibate women consecrate in Herder Korrespondenz June 2017, p. 49ff., ISSN  0018-0645
  48. ↑ Thomas Suermann de Nocker, Economic Competence for the Communities in Herder Korrespondenz June 2017, p. 34ff., ISSN  0018-0645
  49. ↑ Lorenz Wachinger The married priests In: Christ in the present. 69th year, 2017, p. 277
  50. ^ Church today: For the ordination of women and the abolition of celibacy , January 11, 2004
  51. ↑ IKVU: International Women's Day ( Memento from May 25, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
  52. ↑ Bettina Gabbe: A long list of urgent tasks . ( Memento from September 28, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) In: Wiesbadener Kurier , April 5, 2005
  53. ↑ 20min: Interview with Swiss Federal Councilor Leuthard , April 8, 2007
  54. ↑ Netzzeitung: Drewermann calls the Vatican decree "infamous" ( memento of November 26, 2005 in the Internet Archive )
  55. ↑ kathisch.de : Amazonas Synod votes for married priests in exceptional cases , October 27, 2019.
  56. ↑ Querida Amazonia , No. 2f.
  57. ↑ Querida Amazonia , No. 92
  58. ↑ a b Spiritual Green Card . In: Der Spiegel . No. 47 , 2001 ( online ).
  59. ↑ Kath.net : Africa wants to alleviate the need for priests in Europe April 28, 2007
  60. ↑ Guest workers of the Lord . In: Der Spiegel . No. 47 , 2013 ( online ).
  61. ^ Shortage of pastors among the Protestants. Münchner Merkur , January 22, 2015, accessed on August 6, 2016 .
  62. ^ Shortage of pastors: the pulpit will remain empty in future. evangelisch.de: Joint work of Evangelical Journalism (GEP), August 16, 2011, accessed on August 6, 2016 .
  63. ^ Shortage of pastors in the Evangelical Church: When the pulpit remains empty. SWR Südwestrundfunk, June 6, 2015, accessed on August 6, 2016 .
  64. ↑ Evangelical Church in Zweibrücken: More quality than quantity. SWR Südwestrundfunk , April 16, 2016, accessed on August 6, 2016 .
  65. ↑ Protestant churches in Switzerland also have problems with young people. evangelisch.de: Joint work of Evangelical Journalism (GEP), September 19, 2014, accessed on August 6, 2016 .
  66. ↑ Pastorless time in Weiz. There is also a shortage of pastors in the Protestant Church. Little newspaper . Daily newspaper for Styria and Carinthia, March 1, 2013, accessed on August 10, 2016 .