[StAthanasiustheGreat]

Exactly my point. Considering that only 25% of all Catholics attend Mass regularly, down from 80% or so at the height of the Church in America, it is reasonable to expect 66% less priests, since there are 66% less Catholics to serve.

[SaltyJoe]

"Considering that only 25% of all Catholics attend Mass regularly, down from 80%"

For a few years I've been working in a different city (in a notorious "blue" state too!). When I'm there, I go to a particular Parish. The Mass attendance has been growing steadily. It might surprise you, but the pews aren't filling with a bunch of gray haired old people "cramming for a final". It's actually a bunch of young adult new comers! Most likely, they're not only there to receive Holy Communion, but to find other young adults and marriage material. I don't think it was 9/11 or even the political battlesphere that brought the crowd. I think it was Pope JP#2 and Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ that did more than all other recent human events combined.

[Diva]

The document also noted declining Mass attendance -- in some countries, only 5 percent of the faithful attend -- as well as the priest shortage. It cited statistics showing there was one priest for every 1,797 Catholics in 1978 compared with one priest for every 2,677 Catholics in 2003.

Yeah, the article states only 5% in some countries so why the belly-aching about shortages of priests? They are about to close a lot of parishes here in the Detroit archdiocese. I've heard numbers from 25 to as many as 50. Heck, we could get rid of some of the more dissodent preists and still have plenty left over to run the parishes.

My guess is the real complaint from these people of futurechurch and such, is that there is a shortage of the "right" kind of priests...you know, certain nuns who have been hoping for so long and those who want to make the Church into their own image.