{"id":18632,"date":"2017-03-08T19:22:00","date_gmt":"2017-03-08T19:22:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/news\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage-18800\/"},"modified":"2017-03-08T19:22:00","modified_gmt":"2017-03-08T19:22:00","slug":"pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/","title":{"rendered":"Pope Francis has some ideas on how to fix the priest shortage"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/images\/Pope_Francis_on_retreat_at_the_Casa_Divin_Maestro_in_Ariccia_March_4_2017_Credit_LOsservatore_Romano_2_CNA.jpg\"><\/p>\n<p>Vatican City, Mar 8, 2017 \/ 12:22 pm (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">CNA\/EWTN News<\/a>).- In a newly-released interview Pope Francis discussed the shortage of vocations to the priesthood, saying the first response must be prayer. He also mentioned working with youth, the low birthrate, and the ordination of married men.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe first [response]\u00a0 \u2013 because I speak as a believer \u2013 the Lord told us to pray. Prayer, prayer is missing,\u201d Pope Francis said in <a href=\"http:\/\/www.zeit.de\/gesellschaft\/2017-03\/papst-franziskus-zeit-interview\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">an interview with German weekly <em>Die Zeit<\/em> published March 8<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>He called the lack of priests, to the point that some parishes are cared for by female \u201ccommunity leaders\u201d in Switzerland, \u201ca problem that the Church must resolve.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>After prayer, he recommended working \u201cwith youth who are seeking orientation. And this is very difficult, the work with youth, but it must be done because they ask for this: the youth are the great discarded ones in modern society, because they have no work in many countries.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFor vocations, there is also another problem,\u201d he said, \u201cthe problem of the birthrate. If there are no young men there can be no priests.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He repeated his caution against \u201cproselytism,\u201d saying, \u201cYou can\u2019t gain vocations with proselytism. 'Proselytism' \u2013 as if it were a charity society that makes you a partner.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Without priestly vocations \u201cthe Church is weakened, because a Church without the Eucharist doesn\u2019t have strength: the Church makes the Eucharist, but the Eucharist also makes the Church. The problem of vocations is a serious problem.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Turning to the question of relaxing permissions for the ordination of married men and the requirement of priestly celibacy, he said that \u201coptional celibacy is discussed, above all where priests are needed. But optional celibacy is not the solution.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>His interviewer asked if the permission for the ordination of <em>viri probati<\/em> \u2013 older married men \u2013 to the diaconate could be expanded to the priesthood.<\/p>\n<p>While saying making celibacy optional for priests is not the solution, Pope Francis also signalled an openness to discussing the possibility.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe must think yes, <em>viri probati<\/em> are a possibility. But then we must also consider what tasks they could perform, for example in isolated communities.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The interview opened with a discussion of Pope Francis' devotion to Our Lady, Untier of Knots, and also touched on faith, populism, the Roman Curia, and his international trips.<\/p>\n<p>Regarding faith, he said that \u201cone can\u2019t grow without crisis \u2026 crisis is part of the life of faith; a faith which doesn\u2019t enter into crisis to grow, remains juvenile.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Turning to populism, he expressed his concern over the movement's expansion in Europe. \u201cPopulism is evil and ends badly, as the past century has shown \u2026 Behind populism there is always a messianism: always.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He reminded people that he is imperfect, saying: \u201cI am a sinner, I am limited. We must not forget that the idealization of a person is a subtle form of aggression, it\u2019s a way to subtly attack a person. And when I am idealized, I feel attacked.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Pope Francis also discussed international trips he hopes to take, and mentioned that he won't plan to go to Germany this year, or the next.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI can\u2019t go to Russia because I would also have to go to Ukraine,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe important one would be to go to South Sudan, which I don\u2019t think I\u2019ll be able to do \u2013 it was in the schedule to go to the two Congos: with Kabila [president of the Democratic Republic of the Congo] things aren\u2019t going well, I don\u2019t think I\u2019ll be able to go; but I will go to India and Bangladesh, for sure, to Colombia, and then a day in Portugal, in Fatima, and then I think that there\u2019s another trip being studied, to Egypt: it seems like a full calendar, no?\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"feedflare\">\n<a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/catholicnewsagency\/dailynews?a=-suG63yCL-o:VOVyf5BODe8:yIl2AUoC8zA\" class=\" decorated-link\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/catholicnewsagency\/dailynews?d=yIl2AUoC8zA\" border=\"0\"><\/a>\n<\/div>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~r\/catholicnewsagency\/dailynews\/~4\/-suG63yCL-o\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\" alt=\"\"><\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/images\/Pope_Francis_on_retreat_at_the_Casa_Divin_Maestro_in_Ariccia_March_4_2017_Credit_LOsservatore_Romano_2_CNA.jpg\"><\/p>\n<p>Vatican City, Mar 8, 2017 \/ 12:22 pm (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/\" target=\"_self\">CNA\/EWTN News<\/a>).- In a newly-released interview Pope Francis discussed the shortage of vocations to the priesthood, saying the first response must be prayer. He also mentioned working with youth, the low birthrate, and the ordination of married men.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;The first [response]&nbsp; &ndash; because I speak as a believer &ndash; the Lord told us to pray. Prayer, prayer is missing,&rdquo; Pope Francis said in <a href=\"http:\/\/www.zeit.de\/gesellschaft\/2017-03\/papst-franziskus-zeit-interview\">an interview with German weekly <em>Die Zeit<\/em> published March 8<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>He called the lack of priests, to the point that some parishes are cared for by female &ldquo;community leaders&rdquo; in Switzerland, &ldquo;a problem that the Church must resolve.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>After prayer, he recommended working &ldquo;with youth who are seeking orientation. And this is very difficult, the work with youth, but it must be done because they ask for this: the youth are the great discarded ones in modern society, because they have no work in many countries.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;For vocations, there is also another problem,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;the problem of the birthrate. If there are no young men there can be no priests.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>He repeated his caution against &ldquo;proselytism,&rdquo; saying, &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t gain vocations with proselytism. &#8216;Proselytism&#8217; &ndash; as if it were a charity society that makes you a partner.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Without priestly vocations &ldquo;the Church is weakened, because a Church without the Eucharist doesn&rsquo;t have strength: the Church makes the Eucharist, but the Eucharist also makes the Church. The problem of vocations is a serious problem.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Turning to the question of relaxing permissions for the ordination of married men and the requirement of priestly celibacy, he said that &ldquo;optional celibacy is discussed, above all where priests are needed. But optional celibacy is not the solution.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>His interviewer asked if the permission for the ordination of <em>viri probati<\/em> &ndash; older married men &ndash; to the diaconate could be expanded to the priesthood.<\/p>\n<p>While saying making celibacy optional for priests is not the solution, Pope Francis also signalled an openness to discussing the possibility.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;We must think yes, <em>viri probati<\/em> are a possibility. But then we must also consider what tasks they could perform, for example in isolated communities.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>The interview opened with a discussion of Pope Francis&#8217; devotion to Our Lady, Untier of Knots, and also touched on faith, populism, the Roman Curia, and his international trips.<\/p>\n<p>Regarding faith, he said that &ldquo;one can&rsquo;t grow without crisis &hellip; crisis is part of the life of faith; a faith which doesn&rsquo;t enter into crisis to grow, remains juvenile.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Turning to populism, he expressed his concern over the movement&#8217;s expansion in Europe. &ldquo;Populism is evil and ends badly, as the past century has shown &hellip; Behind populism there is always a messianism: always.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>He reminded people that he is imperfect, saying: &ldquo;I am a sinner, I am limited. We must not forget that the idealization of a person is a subtle form of aggression, it&rsquo;s a way to subtly attack a person. And when I am idealized, I feel attacked.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Pope Francis also discussed international trips he hopes to take, and mentioned that he won&#8217;t plan to go to Germany this year, or the next.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;I can&rsquo;t go to Russia because I would also have to go to Ukraine,&rdquo; he added.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;The important one would be to go to South Sudan, which I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to do &ndash; it was in the schedule to go to the two Congos: with Kabila [president of the Democratic Republic of the Congo] things aren&rsquo;t going well, I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to go; but I will go to India and Bangladesh, for sure, to Colombia, and then a day in Portugal, in Fatima, and then I think that there&rsquo;s another trip being studied, to Egypt: it seems like a full calendar, no?&rdquo;<\/p>\n<div>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/catholicnewsagency\/dailynews?a=-suG63yCL-o:VOVyf5BODe8:yIl2AUoC8zA\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~ff\/catholicnewsagency\/dailynews?d=yIl2AUoC8zA\" border=\"0\"><\/a>\n<\/div>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~r\/catholicnewsagency\/dailynews\/~4\/-suG63yCL-o\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\" alt=\"\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1031,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-vatican"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Pope Francis has some ideas on how to fix the priest shortage<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Vatican City, Mar 8, 2017 \/ 12:22 pm (CNA\/EWTN News).- In a newly-released interview Pope Francis discussed the shortage of vocations to the priesthood, saying the first response must be prayer. He also mentioned working with youth, the low birthrate, and the ordination of married men. &ldquo;The first &nbsp; &ndash; because I speak as a believer &ndash; the Lord told us to pray. Prayer, prayer is missing,&rdquo; Pope Francis said in an interview with German weekly Die Zeit published March 8. He called the lack of priests, to the point that some parishes are cared for by female &ldquo;community leaders&rdquo; in Switzerland, &ldquo;a problem that the Church must resolve.&rdquo; After prayer, he recommended working &ldquo;with youth who are seeking orientation. And this is very difficult, the work with youth, but it must be done because they ask for this: the youth are the great discarded ones in modern society, because they have no work in many countries.&rdquo; &ldquo;For vocations, there is also another problem,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;the problem of the birthrate. If there are no young men there can be no priests.&rdquo; He repeated his caution against &ldquo;proselytism,&rdquo; saying, &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t gain vocations with proselytism. &#039;Proselytism&#039; &ndash; as if it were a charity society that makes you a partner.&rdquo; Without priestly vocations &ldquo;the Church is weakened, because a Church without the Eucharist doesn&rsquo;t have strength: the Church makes the Eucharist, but the Eucharist also makes the Church. The problem of vocations is a serious problem.&rdquo; Turning to the question of relaxing permissions for the ordination of married men and the requirement of priestly celibacy, he said that &ldquo;optional celibacy is discussed, above all where priests are needed. But optional celibacy is not the solution.&rdquo; His interviewer asked if the permission for the ordination of viri probati &ndash; older married men &ndash; to the diaconate could be expanded to the priesthood. While saying making celibacy optional for priests is not the solution, Pope Francis also signalled an openness to discussing the possibility. &ldquo;We must think yes, viri probati are a possibility. But then we must also consider what tasks they could perform, for example in isolated communities.&rdquo; The interview opened with a discussion of Pope Francis&#039; devotion to Our Lady, Untier of Knots, and also touched on faith, populism, the Roman Curia, and his international trips. Regarding faith, he said that &ldquo;one can&rsquo;t grow without crisis &hellip; crisis is part of the life of faith; a faith which doesn&rsquo;t enter into crisis to grow, remains juvenile.&rdquo; Turning to populism, he expressed his concern over the movement&#039;s expansion in Europe. &ldquo;Populism is evil and ends badly, as the past century has shown &hellip; Behind populism there is always a messianism: always.&rdquo; He reminded people that he is imperfect, saying: &ldquo;I am a sinner, I am limited. We must not forget that the idealization of a person is a subtle form of aggression, it&rsquo;s a way to subtly attack a person. And when I am idealized, I feel attacked.&rdquo; Pope Francis also discussed international trips he hopes to take, and mentioned that he won&#039;t plan to go to Germany this year, or the next. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t go to Russia because I would also have to go to Ukraine,&rdquo; he added. &ldquo;The important one would be to go to South Sudan, which I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to do &ndash; it was in the schedule to go to the two Congos: with Kabila things aren&rsquo;t going well, I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to go; but I will go to India and Bangladesh, for sure, to Colombia, and then a day in Portugal, in Fatima, and then I think that there&rsquo;s another trip being studied, to Egypt: it seems like a full calendar, no?&rdquo;\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Pope Francis has some ideas on how to fix the priest shortage\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Vatican City, Mar 8, 2017 \/ 12:22 pm (CNA\/EWTN News).- In a newly-released interview Pope Francis discussed the shortage of vocations to the priesthood, saying the first response must be prayer. He also mentioned working with youth, the low birthrate, and the ordination of married men. &ldquo;The first &nbsp; &ndash; because I speak as a believer &ndash; the Lord told us to pray. Prayer, prayer is missing,&rdquo; Pope Francis said in an interview with German weekly Die Zeit published March 8. He called the lack of priests, to the point that some parishes are cared for by female &ldquo;community leaders&rdquo; in Switzerland, &ldquo;a problem that the Church must resolve.&rdquo; After prayer, he recommended working &ldquo;with youth who are seeking orientation. And this is very difficult, the work with youth, but it must be done because they ask for this: the youth are the great discarded ones in modern society, because they have no work in many countries.&rdquo; &ldquo;For vocations, there is also another problem,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;the problem of the birthrate. If there are no young men there can be no priests.&rdquo; He repeated his caution against &ldquo;proselytism,&rdquo; saying, &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t gain vocations with proselytism. &#039;Proselytism&#039; &ndash; as if it were a charity society that makes you a partner.&rdquo; Without priestly vocations &ldquo;the Church is weakened, because a Church without the Eucharist doesn&rsquo;t have strength: the Church makes the Eucharist, but the Eucharist also makes the Church. The problem of vocations is a serious problem.&rdquo; Turning to the question of relaxing permissions for the ordination of married men and the requirement of priestly celibacy, he said that &ldquo;optional celibacy is discussed, above all where priests are needed. But optional celibacy is not the solution.&rdquo; His interviewer asked if the permission for the ordination of viri probati &ndash; older married men &ndash; to the diaconate could be expanded to the priesthood. While saying making celibacy optional for priests is not the solution, Pope Francis also signalled an openness to discussing the possibility. &ldquo;We must think yes, viri probati are a possibility. But then we must also consider what tasks they could perform, for example in isolated communities.&rdquo; The interview opened with a discussion of Pope Francis&#039; devotion to Our Lady, Untier of Knots, and also touched on faith, populism, the Roman Curia, and his international trips. Regarding faith, he said that &ldquo;one can&rsquo;t grow without crisis &hellip; crisis is part of the life of faith; a faith which doesn&rsquo;t enter into crisis to grow, remains juvenile.&rdquo; Turning to populism, he expressed his concern over the movement&#039;s expansion in Europe. &ldquo;Populism is evil and ends badly, as the past century has shown &hellip; Behind populism there is always a messianism: always.&rdquo; He reminded people that he is imperfect, saying: &ldquo;I am a sinner, I am limited. We must not forget that the idealization of a person is a subtle form of aggression, it&rsquo;s a way to subtly attack a person. And when I am idealized, I feel attacked.&rdquo; Pope Francis also discussed international trips he hopes to take, and mentioned that he won&#039;t plan to go to Germany this year, or the next. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t go to Russia because I would also have to go to Ukraine,&rdquo; he added. &ldquo;The important one would be to go to South Sudan, which I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to do &ndash; it was in the schedule to go to the two Congos: with Kabila things aren&rsquo;t going well, I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to go; but I will go to India and Bangladesh, for sure, to Colombia, and then a day in Portugal, in Fatima, and then I think that there&rsquo;s another trip being studied, to Egypt: it seems like a full calendar, no?&rdquo;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Catholic News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-03-08T19:22:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/images\/Pope_Francis_on_retreat_at_the_Casa_Divin_Maestro_in_Ariccia_March_4_2017_Credit_LOsservatore_Romano_2_CNA.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"CNA Daily News\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"CNA Daily News\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/\",\"name\":\"Pope Francis has some ideas on how to fix the priest shortage\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2017-03-08T19:22:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-03-08T19:22:00+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/35d4bd7addc580050842c844a11575f1\"},\"description\":\"Vatican City, Mar 8, 2017 \/ 12:22 pm (CNA\/EWTN News).- In a newly-released interview Pope Francis discussed the shortage of vocations to the priesthood, saying the first response must be prayer. He also mentioned working with youth, the low birthrate, and the ordination of married men. &ldquo;The first &nbsp; &ndash; because I speak as a believer &ndash; the Lord told us to pray. Prayer, prayer is missing,&rdquo; Pope Francis said in an interview with German weekly Die Zeit published March 8. He called the lack of priests, to the point that some parishes are cared for by female &ldquo;community leaders&rdquo; in Switzerland, &ldquo;a problem that the Church must resolve.&rdquo; After prayer, he recommended working &ldquo;with youth who are seeking orientation. And this is very difficult, the work with youth, but it must be done because they ask for this: the youth are the great discarded ones in modern society, because they have no work in many countries.&rdquo; &ldquo;For vocations, there is also another problem,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;the problem of the birthrate. If there are no young men there can be no priests.&rdquo; He repeated his caution against &ldquo;proselytism,&rdquo; saying, &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t gain vocations with proselytism. 'Proselytism' &ndash; as if it were a charity society that makes you a partner.&rdquo; Without priestly vocations &ldquo;the Church is weakened, because a Church without the Eucharist doesn&rsquo;t have strength: the Church makes the Eucharist, but the Eucharist also makes the Church. The problem of vocations is a serious problem.&rdquo; Turning to the question of relaxing permissions for the ordination of married men and the requirement of priestly celibacy, he said that &ldquo;optional celibacy is discussed, above all where priests are needed. But optional celibacy is not the solution.&rdquo; His interviewer asked if the permission for the ordination of viri probati &ndash; older married men &ndash; to the diaconate could be expanded to the priesthood. While saying making celibacy optional for priests is not the solution, Pope Francis also signalled an openness to discussing the possibility. &ldquo;We must think yes, viri probati are a possibility. But then we must also consider what tasks they could perform, for example in isolated communities.&rdquo; The interview opened with a discussion of Pope Francis' devotion to Our Lady, Untier of Knots, and also touched on faith, populism, the Roman Curia, and his international trips. Regarding faith, he said that &ldquo;one can&rsquo;t grow without crisis &hellip; crisis is part of the life of faith; a faith which doesn&rsquo;t enter into crisis to grow, remains juvenile.&rdquo; Turning to populism, he expressed his concern over the movement's expansion in Europe. &ldquo;Populism is evil and ends badly, as the past century has shown &hellip; Behind populism there is always a messianism: always.&rdquo; He reminded people that he is imperfect, saying: &ldquo;I am a sinner, I am limited. We must not forget that the idealization of a person is a subtle form of aggression, it&rsquo;s a way to subtly attack a person. And when I am idealized, I feel attacked.&rdquo; Pope Francis also discussed international trips he hopes to take, and mentioned that he won't plan to go to Germany this year, or the next. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t go to Russia because I would also have to go to Ukraine,&rdquo; he added. &ldquo;The important one would be to go to South Sudan, which I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to do &ndash; it was in the schedule to go to the two Congos: with Kabila things aren&rsquo;t going well, I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to go; but I will go to India and Bangladesh, for sure, to Colombia, and then a day in Portugal, in Fatima, and then I think that there&rsquo;s another trip being studied, to Egypt: it seems like a full calendar, no?&rdquo;\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Pope Francis has some ideas on how to fix the priest shortage\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/\",\"name\":\"Catholic News\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/35d4bd7addc580050842c844a11575f1\",\"name\":\"CNA Daily News\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8f1180c7dca7995d4a997aac72a3a88a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8f1180c7dca7995d4a997aac72a3a88a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"CNA Daily News\"},\"sameAs\":[\"http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/author\/cna-daily-news\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Pope Francis has some ideas on how to fix the priest shortage","description":"Vatican City, Mar 8, 2017 \/ 12:22 pm (CNA\/EWTN News).- In a newly-released interview Pope Francis discussed the shortage of vocations to the priesthood, saying the first response must be prayer. He also mentioned working with youth, the low birthrate, and the ordination of married men. &ldquo;The first &nbsp; &ndash; because I speak as a believer &ndash; the Lord told us to pray. Prayer, prayer is missing,&rdquo; Pope Francis said in an interview with German weekly Die Zeit published March 8. He called the lack of priests, to the point that some parishes are cared for by female &ldquo;community leaders&rdquo; in Switzerland, &ldquo;a problem that the Church must resolve.&rdquo; After prayer, he recommended working &ldquo;with youth who are seeking orientation. And this is very difficult, the work with youth, but it must be done because they ask for this: the youth are the great discarded ones in modern society, because they have no work in many countries.&rdquo; &ldquo;For vocations, there is also another problem,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;the problem of the birthrate. If there are no young men there can be no priests.&rdquo; He repeated his caution against &ldquo;proselytism,&rdquo; saying, &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t gain vocations with proselytism. 'Proselytism' &ndash; as if it were a charity society that makes you a partner.&rdquo; Without priestly vocations &ldquo;the Church is weakened, because a Church without the Eucharist doesn&rsquo;t have strength: the Church makes the Eucharist, but the Eucharist also makes the Church. The problem of vocations is a serious problem.&rdquo; Turning to the question of relaxing permissions for the ordination of married men and the requirement of priestly celibacy, he said that &ldquo;optional celibacy is discussed, above all where priests are needed. But optional celibacy is not the solution.&rdquo; His interviewer asked if the permission for the ordination of viri probati &ndash; older married men &ndash; to the diaconate could be expanded to the priesthood. While saying making celibacy optional for priests is not the solution, Pope Francis also signalled an openness to discussing the possibility. &ldquo;We must think yes, viri probati are a possibility. But then we must also consider what tasks they could perform, for example in isolated communities.&rdquo; The interview opened with a discussion of Pope Francis' devotion to Our Lady, Untier of Knots, and also touched on faith, populism, the Roman Curia, and his international trips. Regarding faith, he said that &ldquo;one can&rsquo;t grow without crisis &hellip; crisis is part of the life of faith; a faith which doesn&rsquo;t enter into crisis to grow, remains juvenile.&rdquo; Turning to populism, he expressed his concern over the movement's expansion in Europe. &ldquo;Populism is evil and ends badly, as the past century has shown &hellip; Behind populism there is always a messianism: always.&rdquo; He reminded people that he is imperfect, saying: &ldquo;I am a sinner, I am limited. We must not forget that the idealization of a person is a subtle form of aggression, it&rsquo;s a way to subtly attack a person. And when I am idealized, I feel attacked.&rdquo; Pope Francis also discussed international trips he hopes to take, and mentioned that he won't plan to go to Germany this year, or the next. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t go to Russia because I would also have to go to Ukraine,&rdquo; he added. &ldquo;The important one would be to go to South Sudan, which I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to do &ndash; it was in the schedule to go to the two Congos: with Kabila things aren&rsquo;t going well, I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to go; but I will go to India and Bangladesh, for sure, to Colombia, and then a day in Portugal, in Fatima, and then I think that there&rsquo;s another trip being studied, to Egypt: it seems like a full calendar, no?&rdquo;","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Pope Francis has some ideas on how to fix the priest shortage","og_description":"Vatican City, Mar 8, 2017 \/ 12:22 pm (CNA\/EWTN News).- In a newly-released interview Pope Francis discussed the shortage of vocations to the priesthood, saying the first response must be prayer. He also mentioned working with youth, the low birthrate, and the ordination of married men. &ldquo;The first &nbsp; &ndash; because I speak as a believer &ndash; the Lord told us to pray. Prayer, prayer is missing,&rdquo; Pope Francis said in an interview with German weekly Die Zeit published March 8. He called the lack of priests, to the point that some parishes are cared for by female &ldquo;community leaders&rdquo; in Switzerland, &ldquo;a problem that the Church must resolve.&rdquo; After prayer, he recommended working &ldquo;with youth who are seeking orientation. And this is very difficult, the work with youth, but it must be done because they ask for this: the youth are the great discarded ones in modern society, because they have no work in many countries.&rdquo; &ldquo;For vocations, there is also another problem,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;the problem of the birthrate. If there are no young men there can be no priests.&rdquo; He repeated his caution against &ldquo;proselytism,&rdquo; saying, &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t gain vocations with proselytism. 'Proselytism' &ndash; as if it were a charity society that makes you a partner.&rdquo; Without priestly vocations &ldquo;the Church is weakened, because a Church without the Eucharist doesn&rsquo;t have strength: the Church makes the Eucharist, but the Eucharist also makes the Church. The problem of vocations is a serious problem.&rdquo; Turning to the question of relaxing permissions for the ordination of married men and the requirement of priestly celibacy, he said that &ldquo;optional celibacy is discussed, above all where priests are needed. But optional celibacy is not the solution.&rdquo; His interviewer asked if the permission for the ordination of viri probati &ndash; older married men &ndash; to the diaconate could be expanded to the priesthood. While saying making celibacy optional for priests is not the solution, Pope Francis also signalled an openness to discussing the possibility. &ldquo;We must think yes, viri probati are a possibility. But then we must also consider what tasks they could perform, for example in isolated communities.&rdquo; The interview opened with a discussion of Pope Francis' devotion to Our Lady, Untier of Knots, and also touched on faith, populism, the Roman Curia, and his international trips. Regarding faith, he said that &ldquo;one can&rsquo;t grow without crisis &hellip; crisis is part of the life of faith; a faith which doesn&rsquo;t enter into crisis to grow, remains juvenile.&rdquo; Turning to populism, he expressed his concern over the movement's expansion in Europe. &ldquo;Populism is evil and ends badly, as the past century has shown &hellip; Behind populism there is always a messianism: always.&rdquo; He reminded people that he is imperfect, saying: &ldquo;I am a sinner, I am limited. We must not forget that the idealization of a person is a subtle form of aggression, it&rsquo;s a way to subtly attack a person. And when I am idealized, I feel attacked.&rdquo; Pope Francis also discussed international trips he hopes to take, and mentioned that he won't plan to go to Germany this year, or the next. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t go to Russia because I would also have to go to Ukraine,&rdquo; he added. &ldquo;The important one would be to go to South Sudan, which I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to do &ndash; it was in the schedule to go to the two Congos: with Kabila things aren&rsquo;t going well, I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to go; but I will go to India and Bangladesh, for sure, to Colombia, and then a day in Portugal, in Fatima, and then I think that there&rsquo;s another trip being studied, to Egypt: it seems like a full calendar, no?&rdquo;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/","og_site_name":"Catholic News","article_published_time":"2017-03-08T19:22:00+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/images\/Pope_Francis_on_retreat_at_the_Casa_Divin_Maestro_in_Ariccia_March_4_2017_Credit_LOsservatore_Romano_2_CNA.jpg"}],"author":"CNA Daily News","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"CNA Daily News","Est. reading time":"3 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/","name":"Pope Francis has some ideas on how to fix the priest shortage","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#website"},"datePublished":"2017-03-08T19:22:00+00:00","dateModified":"2017-03-08T19:22:00+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/35d4bd7addc580050842c844a11575f1"},"description":"Vatican City, Mar 8, 2017 \/ 12:22 pm (CNA\/EWTN News).- In a newly-released interview Pope Francis discussed the shortage of vocations to the priesthood, saying the first response must be prayer. He also mentioned working with youth, the low birthrate, and the ordination of married men. &ldquo;The first &nbsp; &ndash; because I speak as a believer &ndash; the Lord told us to pray. Prayer, prayer is missing,&rdquo; Pope Francis said in an interview with German weekly Die Zeit published March 8. He called the lack of priests, to the point that some parishes are cared for by female &ldquo;community leaders&rdquo; in Switzerland, &ldquo;a problem that the Church must resolve.&rdquo; After prayer, he recommended working &ldquo;with youth who are seeking orientation. And this is very difficult, the work with youth, but it must be done because they ask for this: the youth are the great discarded ones in modern society, because they have no work in many countries.&rdquo; &ldquo;For vocations, there is also another problem,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;the problem of the birthrate. If there are no young men there can be no priests.&rdquo; He repeated his caution against &ldquo;proselytism,&rdquo; saying, &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t gain vocations with proselytism. 'Proselytism' &ndash; as if it were a charity society that makes you a partner.&rdquo; Without priestly vocations &ldquo;the Church is weakened, because a Church without the Eucharist doesn&rsquo;t have strength: the Church makes the Eucharist, but the Eucharist also makes the Church. The problem of vocations is a serious problem.&rdquo; Turning to the question of relaxing permissions for the ordination of married men and the requirement of priestly celibacy, he said that &ldquo;optional celibacy is discussed, above all where priests are needed. But optional celibacy is not the solution.&rdquo; His interviewer asked if the permission for the ordination of viri probati &ndash; older married men &ndash; to the diaconate could be expanded to the priesthood. While saying making celibacy optional for priests is not the solution, Pope Francis also signalled an openness to discussing the possibility. &ldquo;We must think yes, viri probati are a possibility. But then we must also consider what tasks they could perform, for example in isolated communities.&rdquo; The interview opened with a discussion of Pope Francis' devotion to Our Lady, Untier of Knots, and also touched on faith, populism, the Roman Curia, and his international trips. Regarding faith, he said that &ldquo;one can&rsquo;t grow without crisis &hellip; crisis is part of the life of faith; a faith which doesn&rsquo;t enter into crisis to grow, remains juvenile.&rdquo; Turning to populism, he expressed his concern over the movement's expansion in Europe. &ldquo;Populism is evil and ends badly, as the past century has shown &hellip; Behind populism there is always a messianism: always.&rdquo; He reminded people that he is imperfect, saying: &ldquo;I am a sinner, I am limited. We must not forget that the idealization of a person is a subtle form of aggression, it&rsquo;s a way to subtly attack a person. And when I am idealized, I feel attacked.&rdquo; Pope Francis also discussed international trips he hopes to take, and mentioned that he won't plan to go to Germany this year, or the next. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t go to Russia because I would also have to go to Ukraine,&rdquo; he added. &ldquo;The important one would be to go to South Sudan, which I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to do &ndash; it was in the schedule to go to the two Congos: with Kabila things aren&rsquo;t going well, I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;ll be able to go; but I will go to India and Bangladesh, for sure, to Colombia, and then a day in Portugal, in Fatima, and then I think that there&rsquo;s another trip being studied, to Egypt: it seems like a full calendar, no?&rdquo;","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/2017\/03\/pope-francis-has-some-ideas-on-how-to-fix-the-priest-shortage\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Pope Francis has some ideas on how to fix the priest shortage"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/","name":"Catholic News","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/35d4bd7addc580050842c844a11575f1","name":"CNA Daily News","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8f1180c7dca7995d4a997aac72a3a88a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/8f1180c7dca7995d4a997aac72a3a88a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"CNA Daily News"},"sameAs":["http:\/\/www.catholicnewsagency.com\/"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/author\/cna-daily-news\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18632","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1031"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18632"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18632\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/catholicnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}