[Incorrigible]

Yep... Got the sermon today that stated the above.

Prayers for more vocations (Conservative Catholics only please! :-)

[Las Vegas Dave]

Heard a similar message in my home town (in NE Ohio), 30 years ago 1 priest for every 2000 people, today 1 priest for every 700, not enough priests for the parishioners, message was "...hope more would want to come into the priesthood".

[sinkspur]

Yes. Pray for vocations.

And pray for discernment for those who guide the Church.

[Coleus]

Pray for Vocations.

In the Diocese of Paterson, NJ, there are only 5 priests under the age of 40 which will serve 111 Parishes!

[Final Authority]

NH parishes are being combined at a fast pace because of a priest shortage and because offerings are off too. I think that the Diocese is short about 25 priests out of a total of about 115. There are a lot of reasons for this. Many of the recent priests (last 25 years) came out of St. Johns in Boston. That is the center of the homosexual and pedophile abuse problem in this area. Another big reason as you pray for vocations is that many families of French-Canadian extraction in NH aspired to have a son and a daughter accept a religious vocation and life. Those were the days when such families had seven or nine children however and a child or two taken outside of the family life was not such an emotional burden and was considered a grace. Such families hardly exist now.

It is time for the church to consider salaried, married priests. I live in a small town with only a Methodist church of 200 families. We sing in the holiday performances because our Catholic church of 2200 families (another town) has none. I must say, the minister of the local church is salaried, married, and very spiritual. He is available seven days a week as well as his wife. A very good model, I think.

Since we had to drive at least five miles to go to mass and had a choice of churches we would often check out the priests schedules on the web site of the Diocese to select the priest that we considered to not be a homosexual. I think many did this because this particular priest filled the church where the others had many fewer in attendance. The diocese has discontinued the practiced of posting the schedules of the traveling priests I think for just such a reason. I could go on and on but it is so disheartening that it is indeed troubling.