Posted on 09/06/2020 11:18:54 AM PDT by ebb tide
We all know there’s a shortage of priestly vocations — but some places are feeling the effects more dramatically than others.
Catholic Masses at San Diego-area Navy bases have ended because the Navy, in what it says is a cost-cutting move, has declined to renew its contracts with Catholic priests, and there are not enough Catholic chaplains on active duty to fill the void.
Protestant services on bases, which are led by active duty chaplains, will continue, said Brian O’Rourke, a Navy Region Southwest spokesman.
The changes to the Navy’s religious ministries are part of a national realignment announced on Aug. 20. It is unclear how many priests this will affect.
“The Navy’s religious ministries priority is reaching and ministering to our largest demographic — active duty Sailors and Marines in the 18-25 year-old range,” O’Rourke wrote in an email. “To meet that mission, the Navy has had to make the difficult decision to discontinue most contracted ministry services.”
In the Navy message announcing the change, Vice Adm. Yancey Lindsey, the commander of Naval Installations Command, said it differently.
“We have a responsibility to use our limited resources wisely in meeting the needs of our personnel,” wrote Lindsey. “Therefore, we will reduce redundancies and capture efficiencies by realigning resources,” noting that religious services will be cut at bases where those services are readily available in the surrounding community outside the base.
To Rev. Jose Pimentel, a priest who has led services at Naval Base Coronado and Naval Air Station North Island for eight years, the loss of his parish isn’t just a personal loss — it’s a loss of the 1st Amendment rights of service members on bases.
“One issue is discrimination (and) another is the violation of your right to practice your religion,” he said when reached by phone Friday.
…While the Navy has an active duty component of clergy — the Chaplain Corps — the number of Catholic priests among them is small, reflecting a worldwide shortage of Catholic priests. To make up for that shortage, the service contracted with priests to lead Catholic services on U.S. bases.
Those contracts are the ones being canceled.
No one ever asked. But if someone were to have asked for a ride to a Catholic church, I certainly would have contacted a local Catholic church to accommodate them.
Fine. But as the article says there are no Catholic priests to administer mass on base
Why aren’t you doing it now?
I moved away. The church I attended still carried on that ministry. Until Covid 19 shut things down.
So what’s makes you think uncontracted Catholic priests will be allowed to just walk on base during this same Covid scamdemic?
There is nothing that gives you a greater sense of security than knowing that the smoldering residue of what was once the worlds greatest Navy is still protecting us with its highly-developed and modern weapons of incompetence, diversity, perversity, and wokeness...
the Catholic Church does not follow traditional Church teachings anymore
We are certainly tasting God’s chastisement for playing fast and loose with “The faith handed down to the saints.”.
“Therefore, we will reduce redundancies and capture efficiencies by realigning resources”.
Word soup
CC
That is a big stretch. The First Amendment says nothing about our Federal government providing places of worship anywhere. When I was a kid, I remember the Fitzpatricks moving to our rural Georgia community and attending our Methodist Church when there were no Catholic Churches within a hundred miles. I'm sure there are Catholic Churches just off base. Catholic Bishoprics should study and answer why Priests are not joining the military.
Protestant ministers most certainly could not “do mass” in lieu of a priest. They could perhaps assist at a communion service and do other pastoral tasks, but a valid Mass requires a validly ordained priest or bishop. If a priest, he also requires permission (”faculties”) to say Mass from a bishop with the authority to give it.
So the Priest can’t hold one service per week for free?? Protestant ministers all over the country, for instance, go to nursing homes and conduct services, gratis. I do not understand why a Priest cannot.
Members of the Coronado and North Island parish say the community they have formed around the base chapel can’t be replicated elsewhere.
“It’s a Navy chapel — a community thing,” said Anne-Marie Miley, a retired Navy pilot who said she has volunteered at the chapel for 11 years. “We get to meet up with other retirees and active duty personnel. The church out in town has a large congregation; it’s much more personal to go on base.”
Richard Haas, a retired Navy Captain who said he has attended chapel at Coronado for 30 years, agreed.
“It’s part of being in the military — the camaraderie,” Haas said. “To me it’s synonymous, you all have a common thread — you served in the military.”
Catholics on active duty also have needs many civilian priests can’t accommodate, Pimentel said. Sacraments such as Holy Communion, confirmation and marriages can be challenging for service members and their families when balancing deployment schedules.
“It’s hard to quantify what I do,” Pimentel said, saying he’s done everything from performing weddings and baptisms to counseling families of service members who died by suicide.
“I’m a 25-year veteran of the Navy and Air Force, so I can provide a certain level of support they wouldn’t get from the civilian side,” he said.
You can guarantee that race and homosexuality training will continue...
Couldn’t Lay Priests do this, if there is such a designation as Lay Priests.
They need the priests on ships. People can go to mass outside the base. I did.
Not one is on a base.
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