Church develops aggressive recruiting plan for priesthood

Catholic congregations in Southern Missouri are flourishing in numbers, posting a 6,000-member gain over the past year. But finding priests to serve them is another matter.

The Springfield-Cape Girardeau Roman Catholic Diocese hasn't been spared from a national pattern that developed over the last few decades: fewer priests available to fill the pulpit.

Church leaders are taking dramatic steps to address the problem. All the money collected in offerings at area Catholic churches this holiday weekend will be used solely to promote the priesthood and religious life in the church. Pope John Paul II called a continental congress for April in Montreal to discuss the matter.

The Catholic Church is the largest Christian denomination in the world and one of the largest in Southeast Missouri, with ties to a highly visible Cape Girardeau hospital and a growing parochial school system.

There are barely two priests per county to serve the Catholic parishes across southern Missouri. Locally, 14 priests serve the 11 parishes and 17,923 Catholics in Cape Girardeau, Bollinger and Scott counties. The number is up 12 percent over 1999.

Seven priests serve the eight parishes of Perry County, which is part of the Archdiocese of St. Louis.

Monsignor Edward Eftink serves as the only priest for Immaculate Conception in Jackson, Mo. If there were more priests available, it is likely the parish would get an associate pastor. "We've got to get enough so that I can retire," said Eftink. "That's where the problem is."

Monsignor Richard Rolwing, the vicar general and ranking Catholic for the area, attributes the problem to a general "drifting away" from religion.

"That's happening on the part of society as a whole," said Rolwing, who is the 74-year-old pastor at St. Mary's Cathedral. "But there is some reluctance on the part of people to go into the religious life. I don't know the reason. I had a happy priesthood myself."

Rolwing said it has created some problems here. There is a church in Kennett that has no resident priest and instead uses an ordained deacon except for Sunday Mass, when another priest fills in. There are similar cases in other parts of the diocese, he said.

But Cape Girardeau hasn't been hit as badly. Rolwing attributes that to the fact that Cape Girardeau has an especially strong Catholic base.

"Cape has an old Catholic faith tradition that goes back over 150 years," he said. "When you have a deep Catholic faith community, it goes a long way in answering the problem."

The first Catholic priest was specifically assigned to Cape Girardeau in 1825. By 1834, there were two parishes. A hospital and schools followed.

The area is also helped by the fact that priests who are retiring are staying in the Cape Girardeau area. "So we are blessed in that because they can help out when it's needed," Rolwing said.

Rapid growth

The big challenge for the church isn't so much the shortage as it has been handling rapid growth, filling vacancies left by retiring priests and staffing parishes in a territory that covers 39 counties, said the Rev. David Hulshof, director of vocations for the Springfield-Cape Girardeau diocese.

With more laity getting involved in the work of the church, such as serving in a soup kitchen or as cantors leading prayers during Mass or administering communion, there is the possibility that more people will consider religious life, Hulshof said.

Lay members in parishes now can help serve communion wafers and wine during the Eucharist celebration, lead the congregation in prayer and make visits to the homebound, which previously were tasks reserved only for priests.

Saturday night's Mass at St. Mary's Cathedral illustrates the point perfectly.

As the parishioners file in -- touching holy water and making the sign of the cross -- several members get ready to help in various ways. One of those is member Bill Crowe, who helps administer communion.

"When I was growing up, I wanted to be a priest," he said. "But frankly, I didn't have the brains, so I think it's a good thing that we can help out, no matter what the reason is."

Ellen Shuck, the church's director of religious education, fills the role of cantor, as she sings the psalms that require a response from the congregation.

"You can be just as holy washing dishes as you can preaching a sermon," Shuck said. "It all depends on if you're doing it for God."

Since the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s, which made sweeping changes in the church and served to increase laity participation in Mass, more people are doing the jobs that priest used to do, Shuck said.

"And it allows me to do something that I've always wanted to do," she said. "I thank God for that."

Priests are emphasizing that members need to be involved in their church, she added.

Younger priests

The average age of priests in the diocese is 53 while the national average is 60, which gives southern Missouri an advantage. But ordinations are just barely keeping up with the demand for priests here. Some dioceses across the country have begun to recruit priests to serve their churches.

"We anticipate the same number of ordinations as retirements in the next few years," Hulshof said. "But in the context of growth, we're still losing ground."

He recently was elected president of the national diocesan vocation directors and will attend the continental congress.

The local diocese's growth in the past year is primarily among the Hispanic communities living in the southwest and in the Bootheel. The diocese serves 68,000 people.

The issue isn't looking at fewer numbers of clergy alone but learning how to better use the resources available in the diocese and local parishes, area priests say.

That's not a problem confined only to Roman Catholics.

About one in four United Methodist pastors in Missouri serve more than one congregation. Among the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, there was a 6 percent drop in clergy between 1999 and 2000. There are 692 fewer pastors than churches among the Assemblies of God congregations in the United States.

Regardless of how other faiths address the problem, Catholic leaders are working hard to promote the priesthood. But if that doesn't work for individuals, they can find other ways to serve, said Rev. J. Friedel, director of Catholic Campus Ministries at Southeast Missouri State University.

"Everyone has a universal call to holiness," Friedel said. "We have equal dignity but different callings."

Yet there is an emphasis in prayers at local parishes for more religious men and women. The church will observe National Vocation Awareness Week Jan. 13-18.

School visits

The church also has been trying to promote the priesthood and religious life through visits to Catholic high schools and university centers so there won't always be a shortage, he said.

Friedel, who serves as diocesan regional director for Cape Girardeau County, said he believes the shortage is the Holy Spirit empowering the church to live a life of ministry. "There isn't as bleak a picture of the priesthood as it sounds," he said.

With fewer religious men and women teaching in parish schools or serving in parish ministry roles, there isn't anyone to influence younger children to consider that lifestyle.

"A powerful witness always has an effect" in recruitment, Hulshof said. But the religious orders cannot be faulted for not having sisters or brothers teaching in schools -- they are experiencing similar declines.

Fifty years ago, schools were led only by clergy and had few lay staff members. Now the opposite is true. "I think all we can do is encourage by our witness and testimony," Eftink said. "It's the Holy Spirit shaping the church for the future."

The church must keep vigilant about creating opportunities for younger people to meet nuns or brothers from religious orders. Catholic Campus Ministry at Southeast recently was honored for its discernment program that helps college students discover their calling -- whether it be to religious life or not.

The program allows students, religious men and women and members from parishes to talk about vocations and missions. "We're all called to something, it's up to them to find out what," Friedel said of the students.

And some already have: four students are either in seminary or contemplating religious life.

Staff writer Scott Moyers contributed to this report.

ljohnston@semissourian.com

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