Problems in Perspective

As a member of our diocese's clergy personnel board, each month a baker's dozen of us priests (and one deacon) meet to advise the bishop on clergy assignments.  Right now, because of strains in the number of priests who are capable of being pastors, thirty of us double up and serve two parishes.  Looming on the horizon is the reality that almost three dozen men are in active ministry who are over the age of 70, our retirement age.  These dedicated souls could retire today, and blow a huge hole in staffing our parishes.  As it is, projections indicate that in eight years, we will only have approximately 100 priests to serve more than 200 parishes, as well as the legion of hospitals, nursing homes, jails, and other institutions needing pastoral care.

It's enough to make you depressed.

But like the man lamenting he has only one shoe, until he meets someone who has only one foot, I had to put our troubles into perspective this week while reading two articles.

The first is the Christmas edition of "Extension," the magazine of the Catholic Extension Society.  This Chicago-based organization has for over 100 years raised money for the "home missions" in rural America.  In this edition they present a "wish list" of 25 projects Extension would love to fulfill, if only they had the money.  These include priests in the Archdiocese of Anchorage who are only able to visit their mission churches by flying; in the U.S. Army only 100 priests fill the available 400 Catholic chaplain slots (and the Archdiocese for Military Services has only 32 seminarians); rebuilding churches in New Mexico, Montana, Puerto Rico, and Oregon;  supporting outreach to Hispanic Catholics in the dioceses of Knoxville and Youngstown; and many others.  Each year for the past ten years the Catholic Extension  Society has paid to build 94 church buildings, over $129 million in donations.  Yet the needs are growing.

And we in the Diocese of Pittsburgh think we have troubles?

The second article is a recent blog post by John L. Allen Jr. ("All Things Catholic" on www.ncronline.org ) regarding the threats to Christians around the world.  He writes, "From Iraq and Egypt, to Indonesia and India, we're witnessing the rise of a whole new generation of Christian martyrs.... Americans, long accustomed to thinking of Christianity as a powerful majority, are often flabbergasted to learn that Christians are actually the most persecuted religious group on the planet."  For example, one year ago an assault on Our Lady of Salvation in Baghdad, a Chaldean Church where 53 people were killed and hundreds injured by al Qaeda-linked gunmen.  This is only one of many attacks.  Allen says over the past eight years, 43 of the 60 Christian churches in Baghdad have been bombed at least once.

When Christian demonstrators were attacked by the Egyptian army in Cairo on October 9, 27 people were left dead, over 300 injured.  In the past year an estimated 93,000 Coptic Christians have fled Egypt and persecution.  These situations rarely are given time in the mainstream American media. 

And we think we have problems?

Allen presents these facts of persecution in a wider context of attacks on religious liberty globally.  He takes to task the U.S. bishops for calling church/state battles over same-sex marriage, proposed mandates from the federal Department of Health and Human Services regarding coverage of contraception and sterilization in private insurance plans, and identity issues over who can be hired by Catholic charitable organizations, issues of religious freedom.  The global view is that Christians are dying because of lack of respect for religious liberty.  "If the church in the United States doesn't speak up on behalf of [the new martyrs], we risk being complicit in constructing a 21st century edition of a 'church of silence.' ... If we [in the U.S.] won't come to the defense of fellow Christians in jeopardy, what hope is there for anyone else."

I've sometimes wondered, what would it be like if at the next Pittsburgh clergy personnel board meeting the vicar for clergy told us the sobering news that in the past month one pastor had been killed by anti-Catholic attacks, and two more seriously wounded.  It certainly would put into perspective our own local troubles in declining clerical numbers.