FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 
 June 2, 2010

Contact: Sr. Christine Schenk chris@futurechurch.org   216-228-0869 X 4 (W); 216-513-3647 (C)

William Wisniewski (Married Catholic Priest) 330-931-0111 (C) 330-297-4153 (W)

Mary Louise Hartman 609-921-9134 (W) 609-915-2258 (C)

At Close of Year For Priests: Catholics Pray for Inclusive Priesthood,

Lament that Faithful Priests Tainted by Scandal

On each first Friday of the month for the past nine months, between 600 and 800 FutureChurch supporters prayed a Novena for an Inclusive Priesthood (see below) to celebrate the Year for Priests. The prayer had a special request. It asked God to “open the hearts and ears of our bishops and our Pope to support and encourage the diaconal and presbyteral calls of both married and celibate Catholics.”

On June 11, they will pray a closing Novena when Pope Benedict XVI presides at an official Mass in the Vatican to bring to a close the Church’s celebration of the Year for priests.

“It is nothing short of devastating that this is taking place in the midst of what many have called ‘the largest institutional crisis in centuries,’” said FutureChurch Executive Director, Sr. Christine Schenk. “I lament that so many good priests are being tainted by this scandal, which does not belong to them but to the criminally self -serving decisions of a closed hierarchical culture.”

“Our Catholic decision-making structures have lost credibility because there is no system of checks and balances and because married men and women have no representation in church governance,” said FutureChurch board member Mary Louise Hartman. “Catholic canon law says that only the ordained can participate in church decision-making. An important first step toward a more credible governance would be to open ordination to all those called to it, married, celibate, male and female.”

“It is apparent that there were no parents or advocates for children at the table when the terrible decisions were made to transfer pedophile priests or cover up abuses by lay coaches or teachers rather than report them to law enforcement officials,” said Bill Wisniewski who is a married priest and the father of two children.

A 2004 anonymous survey of 14,000 priests in 53 US dioceses found that sixty seven percent of respondents believed the church should open discussion about mandatory celibacy. The survey was spearheaded by FutureChurch in partnership with Call To Action. Many priests spontaneously said it was time to discuss ordaining women too, beginning with women deacons.

FutureChurch isn’t stopping with prayer, it is also taking action. In the past year over 5,000 electronic and paper postcards have been sent to Cardinal Claudio Hummes, Prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy, and to local bishops asking them to “begin discussion at the highest levels of the Church about the need to return to our earliest tradition of permitting both a married and a celibate priesthood.” The FutureChurch website has been configured to send electronic and paper postcards in German, Spanish, French, Italian and Portuguese as well as English. Scores of people have also downloaded free organizing kits from the website to begin educational programs, prayer and advocacy initiatives in their locales. An educational web video is also nearing completion.

“We were on the verge of launching the international phase of the campaign but delayed it because of breaking news in Europe and the UK about clergy sex abuse,” said Schenk. While we are glad to learn that some bishops and government officials are asking to change mandatory celibacy, we are sad that it had to come at the expense of victims and the vast majority of faithful priests who are now tainted by the scandal.”

“Parishes in Europe, the United States and the United Kingdom are closing while thousands of Catholics in the developing world have virtually no access to Mass and the sacraments because of too few celibate priests,” she said.

According to a 2007 article in the New York Times, eighty percent of all Sunday celebrations in Brazil are led by lay leaders. In the US, the dioceses of Cleveland, Buffalo and Syracuse have each closed from forty to sixty parishes and the Camden diocese is on track to close sixty of their 124 parishes. In France, bishops have closed half of all parishes with numbers of priests shrinking from 41,000 in 1965 to 20,500 in 2006.

“We need to return to our early Church custom of having both a celibate and a married priesthood,” said Wisniewski. “St. Peter was married. St. Paul was celibate and the early church flourished perhaps in part because it incorporated both ministerial charims. Since celibacy is a gift from the Holy Spirit, it will not disappear, but is a distortion of the charism of celibacy to demand it of priests who are not called to it.”

The organization has also called on Vatican leaders to implement zero tolerance for clergy sex abuse in the worldwide church, as the US Catholic Bishops' Conference did in June 2002, and to implement recommendations issued by the U.S. National Lay Review Board in 2004. These called for increased lay consultation in the selection of bishops and an in-depth study of the relationship of mandatory celibacy to clergy sex abuse. 

The latter recommendation was recently echoed by Vienna's Cardinal Schoenborn.

Novena to the Holy Spirit for an Inclusive Priesthood


to be prayed on the first Friday of every month during the Church’s Year for Priests

Holy Spirit, I believe in your work among us and within us.

I come to you committed to the full expression of the Gospel through the work of the Church. I am saddened by the lack of priests to provide the Eucharist, the Bread of Life, especially in the developing world. I am one of many who hunger for an inclusive priesthood that allows all who are so called to discern ministry to the People of God as a deacon or a priest.

I ask your grace and intercession:

O Holy Spirit, may the fire of your love renew priests all over the world in love and service to the People of God.

O Holy Spirit, let our Church celebrate the gift of celibacy as a powerful grace and yet recognize that it is not given to all called to the ministerial priesthood. We pray for the day that both celibate and married priests serve you through the sacrament of Holy Orders.

O Holy Spirit, let our Church celebrate the powerful expression of love and commitment that is the gift of marriage, a gift that can only enhance the ministerial priesthood for those so called.

O Holy Spirit, continue gifting Catholic women with love, service, and trust that their faithful perseverance will one day lead to structures that mirror their full baptismal equality in the Catholic Church.

O Holy Spirit, open the hearts and ears of our bishops and our Pope to support and encourage the diaconal and presbyteral calls of both married and celibate Catholics.

O Holy Spirit, I bring to you my love and concern for the worldwide Church and ask for your guidance as we move ever closer to the reign of God where all have a place at the table of God.

Amen.

For more information about FutureChurch’s international Optional Celibacy campaign , Official Catholic Directory statistics for every U.S. diocese, and results of our survey of priests in 53 U.S. dioceses visit www.futurechurch.org

FutureChurch, headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio, is a U.S. coalition of 5,000 parish centered Catholics striving to educate fellow Catholics about the seriousness of the priest shortage, the centrality of the Eucharist (the Mass), and the systemic inequality of women in the Catholic Church. FutureChurch makes presentations throughout the country, distributes educational and informational packets and recruits activists who work for full participation of all baptized Catholics in the life of the Church.