Diocese expects serious shortage in near future.
By Anthony Barich
The Archdiocese of Adelaide has launched a Leap Ahead project to address “major issues” facing it in next five to 10 years, including the impending lack of priests.
Leap Ahead was launched late last year by Archbishop Philip Wilson to address major issues facing the archdiocese and to develop a plan to ensure “a vigorous and faithful Church for our future”.
A statement on the Archdiocesan newsletter from January said: “We all know that the process of parishes being asked to twin or amalgamate is draining and challenging and in a few years, with existing resources, they will need to go through the whole process again. Leap Ahead enables us to make our plans for the future and then implement the changes in a systematic way.”
Due to a shortage of priests and vocations, Albert Park/Pennington, Adelaide Hills, Dulwich/Burnside and Kangaroo Island parishes all have a Pastoral Director, with a Priest Moderator, who in most cases is not a resident in the parish. Elizabeth Parish has a Deacon and a Priest Moderator.
“Changes can happen quickly – all it takes is for a priest to get sick or retire and it could be your parish faced with this prospect,” the Archdiocese’s Parish Finance Liaison officers Paul Della and Keiran Hughes said in an April newsletter. “From a financial perspective it means parishes will have to fund the new position of a Pastoral Director.”
After focus groups were held in February, extensive conversations diocese-wide followed in April and May to gather data. Ten discussion groups focused on liturgical life, formation, leadership, pastoral care, cultural communities, finance and property, religious orders, schools, young people and catechesis, and spirituality.
Concurrently, discussions occurred in other meetings with priests, secondary and primary principals and deputy principals of schools in the Archdiocese and with those involved in the leadership of Religious Education.
Following these initial discussion groups, the Leap Ahead team members are seeking further deanery-based conversations.
Of the 54 diocesan parish priests in Adelaide in 1971, 27 were under 50, and 14 were under 40, but priest stocks are expected to be seriously diminished within a few years as many priests there are close to retirement, or are ill, or both.There is no functioning seminary in Adelaide, and only three men are currently understood to be studying for the priesthood – two in Corpus Christi College in Melbourne and one in Rome.