(Paris) numbers are neither traditionalist nor modernist, but facts are being noticed. In France, there are only 14,000 diocesan priests. About half of them are older than 75. This means that the situation is dramatic.
To conduct but one parish is already a big job. In France it has become "normal" that a pastor has to take care of a dozen parishes. A regular celebration of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is impossible. In most parishes it is celebrated only occasionally. In the diocese of Langres, each priest must take care for an average of 50 parishes. In short, it is almost resigned to a spiritual catastrophe. The numbers of priestly ordinations is also discouraging. In 2009, only 89 diocesan priests were ordained in France. Far too little to compensate for the decrease due to death. These numbers seem like reports coming from the front with the losses to an army. You could cry.
Fortunately, there is good and encouraging news coming from the seminaries of tradition. The traditional communities and dioceses have offspring. More, their seminars are full. It is therefore to be hoped that more old rite seminaries will be opened. There is no danger that they remain empty, since there is a strong interest in tradition by young believers.
Text: Cordialiter
image: Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest
image: Institute of Christ the King Sovereign Priest
Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com
AMGD
What crisis? Most parishes in France are half empty with elderly people, they might as well be melanin-free zones. In 10 years there will be no crisis because almost all the practicing Catholics in France today will be dead or in a vegetative state. I guess that's why the call France the "eldest" daughter of the Church.
ReplyDeleteThe only Catholics left with any hair pigmentation in France will be the FSSPX in a decade or two (judging by birth rates and ordinations). I find that overwhelmingly poetic considering that the France played a prominent role in Vatican II.
How many priests are in the traditional seminaries? Please say.
ReplyDeletehttp://eponymousflower.blogspot.com/2012/03/one-third-of-seminarians-in-france-are.html
DeleteBut surely you know, as is taught in some theology schools to this day, that the decrease in vocations is actually a work of the Holy Spirit! For although priestly vocations decrease, the involvement of the laity in the Church increases, with the need for lay pastoral assistants, adminitrators, etc. You see, it's all the work of the Holy Spirit (sarcasm off).
ReplyDeleteIt seems that no amount of statistics proving the demise of the faith in a region, or country even, causes any stir among our hierarchy. Most still cling to an unreasonable hatred of tradition, which is to say all the true teachings of holy mother Church. This hatred goes all the way to the top. The so called and hated tradition is our future though and only those who embrace it will be able to weather this modernist storm.
ReplyDeleteIt is undeniable that the new church has a vocations crisis since the very dawn of the conciliar era - 17,000 priests left Holy Orders with or without permission followed by another 15,000 up to the early seventies. This is a massive number which has never been replaced.
ReplyDeleteNO seminaries, monasteries and convents are mostly in dearth and in decline. There are a few with small growth but these are exceptions. In fact, in spite of all the brouhaha about JP II's popularity and greatly loved status his trips overseas did absolutely nothing to inspire increased rates of vocations to the presbyterate (NO name for it).
Almighty God will not be mocked - the modernist presbyterate has become non-sacral actor performing entertainment in once Sanctuary spaces where worshipers in attendance were called to reverence by the symbol of the red lamp and the Real Presence while the priest offered a bloodless sacrifice of Christ's Calvary reenacted in real time. The NO is complete and utter betrayal of this liturgical vision and imperative being but an ecumenical protestant charade. The countless illicit, invalid and sacrilegious abuses since 1969 have taken their toll as the NO church declines into total chaos losing its attendees by the thousands every month to reduce it to a ridiculous audience of semi-literate neo-liberals who, like most of their bishops and presbyters, don't appear to understand what The Roman Catholic Faith signifies because they are no longer following it. They are submitted to a new paradigm - liturgically, pastorally and ever-more sinister, theologically.