Posted on 05/06/2012 7:34:39 PM PDT by marshmallow
Vatican City, May 6, 2012 / 04:06 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Bishop James D. Conley of Denver said the news of rising seminarian numbers across the United States has delighted Pope Benedict XVI.
“He was very happy to receive that information,” Bishop Conley told CNA on May 4 after meeting the Pope at the Vatican.
“He said he had heard that vocations were going up in the United States and he said this is very positive news and, in fact, he had a big smile on his face when he heard the news.”
Bishop Conley was one of ten bishops from Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico and Wyoming who had an audience with Pope Benedict as part of their five-day “ad limina” pilgrimage to Rome which concludes tomorrow.
He explained to the Pope that there is now a year-on-year increase in the numbers of young men opting for the priesthood across many US dioceses.
“I told him that in the Archdiocese of Denver both of our seminaries, St John Vianney Theological Seminary and Redeptoris Mater Neo-catechumenal seminary, are full,” the bishop added.
“In fact we have more applicants than we have space so for the first time in many years we have to create a waiting list which is a good problem to have.”
The most recent statistics show a similar story across the United States. Last year the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University estimated that the 2011 seminary intake was up 4 percent on the previous year and had reached its highest figure in 20 years. Meanwhile, Rome’s North American College is full to its 250 capacity for the first time in decades.
Upon hearing that Bishop Conley was from Denver, Pope Benedict warmly recalled World Youth Day 1993 which was hosted by the Colorado city.
(Excerpt) Read more at catholicnewsagency.com ...
Clearing out the liberal nuns and folks looking to make the Church 'relevant', went a long way toward making Seminaries look attractive to young men who were looking to serve the Lord. Too many had been turned away in the past 30 years, considered to be too 'immature' because they didn't follow the attitudes of the 'sophisticates' running the Seminaries then. In some Seminaries, young men who survived the original vetting process found they were ostracized if they went against the liberal attitudes they found prevalent, or weren't interested in being propositioned by male faculty or other Seminarians.
I’d like to think it began with Benedict XVI who has given orthodoxy and tradition a new impetus and has invigorated the re-introduction of sacred music and liturgical practices. Clerical ordinations and women religious orders have grown among those committed to strict and formal liturgical forms and habits. Benedictine motto: “When pruned, it grows.”
On sign that the Vatican II reforms had gone awry was the emptying of the seminaries. Those faithful priests who remained were demoralized and most stopped trying to recruit young men to replace them. The liberals de-emphasized the priesthood, even adopted the protestant view that it was a historical creation rather than Apostolic in origin. So we have laypeople handed many of the functions of the priest and of course the cry for a married priesthhood and women priests.John Paul “s great achievement was turning that around. His great gify was to make young men say: Look at him! I want to be like him. He spurred the same ambition in young priests, making them want tom be bishops like him. Now we have bishops who are actively trying to fill up their seminaries. This was not true thirty years ago,not in many dioceses.
Goes to show that spring cleaning works.
How does the church pay for this?
I think we need to credit the Holy Spirit and His instruments both JP II and Benedict for this. Both were/are instrumental. JP II was too soft in many respects compared to Benedict, but he was the right man for the time and the slow movement away. The Church moves incrementally — God’s wheel grinds slowly, but grinds fine.
Good change takes time.
Through the benevolence and generosity of the faithful.
Gay men need jobs too.
If the Church cleaned house and got rid of the fags, then I would suspect it would lead to an increase in vocations. I know I certainly wouldn’t encourage someone to join in such an environment.
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Since the Pope sent emissaries to investigate and clean up the seminaries, they have a wonderful problem — not enough room!
Now the emissaries are going to investigate the liberal and other nuns. May they soon experience this same problem with nuns wearing habits and serving the Lord as He wishes!
Great news. Still a long way to go.
Use that idiotic line during your particular judgment and see what it gets you.
ok, thanx
I bet God already knows he said it...He probably knew he was going to say it before that guy was even born!
Certainly. However, according to Rome, one job they can't have, and for which they aren't suited, is that of a priest in the Catholic church.
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