Letter to Parishes, Lent 2002
Bishop of Arundel and Brighton
In October I wrote to the diocese about the challenges facing us as a result of the growing shortage of priests and how this will have some effect on all of us: no parish will remain immune from the consequences.
Five years ago Canon Jim McConnon prepared a report about the situation. In that he predicted that this year there would be about 120 priests on active service in the diocese. If we take out the religious communities like Worth Abbey (where there are more than 20 priests) then Canon McConnon's predictions were very accurate. It is all the more disturbing, then, when he predicts that in the year 2020 there will be just 27 priests under the age of 75. That is how serious the picture is.
The purpose of this letter is to keep you informed of how things are moving. I have had meetings with priests in various areas and with some parishes. A number of points emerge from these meetings:
Each area will have to be treated differently to meet local needs;
In looking at the future of churches in the area, all factors will have to be taken into account, even down to the size of a church car park;
The demands that will be made of the priest will not be just or even primarily the provision of Sunday mass, but the daily ministry to a large area;
Existing parishes have shown a strong desire to survive as communities, but in order to do this they will need a considerable amount of training in the running of the community to enable it to continue fulfilling its mission;
Lay people will have to accept and be given a much greater responsibility for the future of existing communities;
The present Deanery boundaries might not be best suited to the shape of future parish clusters;
Where a particular parish might in the future still have a resident priest, it must be clear to people that he is not the parish priest of that place alone, but will have equal responsibility for a number of other communities;
Even where some radical changes have taken place already, these changes are by no means final;
The shortage of priests and increased demands on them will have its effect on chaplaincies to places like hospitals and schools;
The simple idea of substituting Eucharistic services for mass is not a good idea and will have to be examined carefully.
The idea is that most areas will have a draft plan ready for Advent this year and that this plan will be submitted to existing parishes for discussion and response. A final plan for the area should then be ready for Advent 2003. The plan should be for the situation envisaged for 2010, when each Deanery will have approximately SIX priests. There seems no point altering plans every year as the shortage of priests increases. This will mean that at the beginning the plans might seem unnecessarily extravagant and harsh, but we must be used to the idea of a reduced priestly ministry when it is finally forced upon us.
The picture in eight or nine years will all be very different, but we need to take steps now to ensure that we are well prepared for it. It is an exciting challenge and the first responses to that challenge have been of enthusiasm and determination.
We must pray for the guidance of the Holy Sprit in all of this and be confident that the Lord is calling us to be his Church in a way that is different from what we are used to. But it is his Church, not ours, and he will not let us fail.
Bishop of Arundel and Brighton
Letter to Parishes, Lent 2002
©, Diocese of Arundel & Brighton, 2002
Created: 27/2/2002 Last Updated: 27/2/2002
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