Posted on 06/24/2017 6:09:41 PM PDT by marshmallow
ROME, June 23, 2017 (LifeSiteNews) -- Vocations to the priesthood have continued a downward trend since 2012, according to data recently released by the Vatican’s Central Statistics Office.
“There is a continuation of the decline which has for some years characterized priestly vocations,” the Statistics Office, which operates under the Vatican Secretariat of State, stated in its 500-page Annuarium Statisticum Ecclesiae that covers up to the year 2015.
One metric for measuring the health of the Church is the number of new vocations to the priesthood to serve the Church’s 1.28 billion Catholics worldwide. A shortage of priests jeopardizes the life of faith for Catholics who no longer have a priest to minister to them.
Vocations to the priesthood rose sharply under the pontificate of St. Pope John Paul II. In 1978, his first year, there were 63,882 seminarians worldwide, but by the year of his death in 2005 there were 114,439.
Total seminarians continued to rise modestly under Benedict XVI, reaching a peak of 120,616 in 2011. They then started a slow decline in 2012, when there were 120,051.
(Excerpt) Read more at lifesitenews.com ...
He seems to me to be a very strange Pope!
Why are Catholic priests forbidden to marry anyway?
The Bible says Bishops must be the husband of one wife.
But marriage “annulment”s are up! Thanks to Bergoglio.
Someone needs to tell Francis that radical environmentalists and socialist street agitators are not vocations
Let not your heart be troubled!! Jesus is coming, really, really soon!! Time to be a victor!! See Revelation Chapters 2 and 3.
Even Jesus and the Holy Ghost don’t know the hour or the day, only the Father.
To concentrate all their energy on ministering to all people instead of just one wife.
Some married priests from Lutheran and Anglican communities convert to Catholicism and then are ordained as Catholic priests. However, not too many.
As we approach the time of the end, this is looking as if it is one of those Mysteries that was hidden in plain site, to be revealed at the time of the end.
Mark 23:32 “But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. [1]
Instead of telling us that we could not know when He was coming back, Jesus was telling us WHERE TO LOOK FOR THE ANSWER! (Sorry for shouting, but this is just too good!)
In the Book of Creation, the Jewish mystics recorded: “And He created His universe with three books (Sepharim), with text (Sepher) with number (Sephar) and with communication (Sippur).” [2}
“With three books Sefer Yetzirah now begins to define the word Sefirah, the Hebrew designation for the divine emanations that form the basis of creation. The Hebrew word for book, Sepher (), has the same root as the word Sephirah (), except that the former is masculine and the latter is feminine. These three books are said to be “text, number, and communication.” The Hebrew word for “text” here is Sepher (), which literally means “book.” “Number” is Sephar (), from which the English word “cipher” is derived. “Communication” is Sippur (), which more literally is “telling.” These three divisions respectively represent quality, quantity, and communication. These are the letters, numbers, and the manner in which they are used. 49 These three books correspond to the three divisions of creation defined by Sefer Yetzirah, namely, “Universe, Year, and Soul.” In more modern terms, these would be called space, time and spirit. “Universe” refers to the dimensions of space, “year” to time, and “soul” to the spiritual dimension.” [3]
Jesus is the Word (text), the Holy Spirit is obviously “communication”, so that leads to the Father being associated with Number!
When I told this to my wife, She said: “No one comes to the Father but through me!” BINGO! One can’t get to the numbers except by reading and believing the text!
1. Nelson, Thomas. Holy Bible, New King James Version (NKJV) (p. 987). Thomas Nelson. Kindle Edition.
2. Kaplan, Aryeh. Sefer Yetzirah: The Book of Creation in Theory and Practice (Kindle Locations 445-449). Red Wheel Weiser. Kindle Edition.
3. Kaplan, Aryeh. Sefer Yetzirah: The Book of Creation in Theory and Practice (Kindle Locations 719-721). Red Wheel Weiser. Kindle Edition.
Pray for vocations. Become a member of the Serra Club and actively support vocations.
No man responds to an “uncertain trumpet” or an estrogen-scented sacristy. In the places where a robust, even virile Catholicism is preached and practiced -— the fullness fo faith and morals -— faith-filled, spirit-lighted young men fill the seminaries.
Lots of people have noticed that by now.
... and they continue to rise for the groups that follow pre-Vatican II Catholicism and offer the Traditional Latin Mass.
Paul is not commanding that bishops be married -- he would have said that if that's what he had meant. He's probably ruling out men who are remarried after being widowed (polygamy was unknown in the Greco-Roman world, so that's not even an issue). The ancients viewed a man who remarried in middle age as being unable to control himself. He may also have been ruling out men who had divorced a pagan wife before converting.
Ruling out single men per se would rule out Jesus and St. John from positions of leadership -- and we know for a fact that St. John served as bishop of Ephesus -- and would also contradict what Paul himself said in 1 Cor 7.
All part of the plan, sadly.
+1
No this is what I call ‘winning’!
JoMa
Assisted at two first masses of young FSSP priests this weekend. Glad to show my support for the sacrament of Holy Orders and young new tradition-supporting priests — sorely needed in this Bergoglian age...
Apparently the bible only applies to bible Christians, not Catholics...
1Ti 3:2 A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach;
1Ti 3:4 One that ruleth well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity;
1Ti 3:5 (For if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?)
Uh, Paul DID command us on this issue...
Exactamundo. Are you new to the Religion Forum? I don’t recall seeing you posting here before.
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