Marrying Priests Counted

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32031, 4 July 1969, Page 11

Marrying Priests Counted

(NZP. A.-Reuter—Copyright) ROME, July 3.

A confidential Vatican study ordered by Pope Paul showed that in the last six years 7137 Roman Catholic priests asked permission to get married and 5652 got it, Vatican sources said yesterday.

The sources said that the statistics were intended to prove that the controversy

over celibacy was not as widespread as it seemed.

The statistics were sent to the Vatican’s envoys abroad in view of a controversy on whether the Church should lift its traditional rule that priests should not marry. This controversy has already led to the resignation of a number of priests, notably in countries where the progressive movement for church reforms is strong. The figures show that the number who have asked to marry amounts to only 3.59 per cent of the 424,883 priests.

The “Australian” reported today that about 150 Australian priests had left the Roman Catholic priesthood in the last 18 months.

the newspaper’s religious writer, Graham Williams, attributed his report to “informed church sources.” He said that there were about 3800 Roman Catholic priests in Australia: that the drift from the priesthood was accelerating: and that many men of outstanding calibre were leaving. Among prominent members of the clergy who left were Dr Kevin Walsh, professor of dogmatic theology at St Patrick’s Seminary, Manly, New South Wales, and two editors of the Roman Catholic newspapers in Victoria and Tasmania.

Williams wrote that the drift from the priesthood was compounded by the falling numbers entering theological! seminaries and also the high, drop-out rate amongst semin- 1 ary students. The latest available figures show that the number of seminary students in Australia declined in the five years to 1967 from 1406 to 1263. In the same period the number of priests increased by 87—a record low increase —while the Roman Catholic population of Australia increased by more than 500,000. He reported a senior Roman Catholic priest in Sydney as saying: “More people are leaving than most ;people think, because large ! numbers leave—particularly lin religious orders —with few people knowing they have gone.” In Melbourne, Dr Max Charlesworth, a leading ; Roman Catholic layman, said

that he regarded 150 as a very conservative estimate of the numbers who had left. He said: “Many of the religious orders have been particularly hard hit by departures of priests and by falloff in seminary students. “What distresses me is that there is no organisation to help these people once they leave the priesthood. “They need counselling to get a good job and they don’t know what work is available. They also need some psychological help in many cases.”