Posted on 07/29/2024 10:03:20 AM PDT by ebb tide
During the General Audience of May 22, 2024, at the greeting the novices of the women’s congregations of Italy in St. Peter’s Square, the Pope expressed his concern about religious vocations. “I see these novices and I ask myself: how many are Italian? Few!”
“There is a shortage of vocations in Italy,” Francis worried. And he urged the faithful: “Let us think and pray for vocations to the consecrated life.”
In fact, in 2021, the data from a report of the Italian Bishops’ Conference revealed that in only 10 years, vocations had declined by 28%. In 50 years, the number of seminarians has decreased by more than half. In 1970, there were 6,337 seminarians, compared to 2,103 in 2019.
More broadly in Europe, in the space of 10 years, the continent lost around 27,000 priests, 6,000 seminarians, and close to 80,000 nuns, according to the latest data on the Catholic Church published in 2023.
Apart from Africa, all continents are experiencing a dramatic decrease in the number of seminarians.
Maybe he should reflect on his shuttering of traditional Catholic seminaries.
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Ping
Just look at western universities - full of post-modern woke neo-marxists.
The vocations Francis wants are just happening elsewhere.
I don’t know .... maybe try NOT cancelling the faithful vocations you already have....
He might get more Catholic priests if he would start acting Catholic.
Hey Pope -
Look in the mirror, you will see the reason why.
It wasn’t long ago that he explicitly stated that he would rather have fewer vocations than those who are not on-board with the modern approach.
Hey Jorge!!!
Quit attacking and suppressing the Latin Mass.
Quit pandering to sodomites and modernists.
Orthodoxy begets vocations.
Allow married (heterosexual) men to become priests!
And yet no one in authority wants to address why we have fewer vocations. It is as if they do not want to know the answer.
They already know the answer. They simply don’t care to fix the problem.
Orthodox bishops and countries get vocations, heterodox bishops and countries do not. It’s simple. If he wants more vocations why does he keep making it harder? For instance, the number of years devoted to discernment has become too long at this point. Enough after 7-9 years, do you have a vocation or do you not?
As well as what is being done to female religious orders/communities.
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