Vocation crisis artificial says bishop

National Catholic Reporter, Oct 20, 1995 by Pamela Schaeffer

"Crisis in vocations? What crisis?" So went a recent headline in Our Sun day Visitor over an article by Archbishop Elden Curtiss of Omaha, Neb., in he charged that the vocation crisis is "artificial and contrived" and is being perpetuated by Catholics, including vocations directors, who want the church change the rules for ordination.

Curtiss wrote that some progressive Catholics, including vocation directors, have a "death wish" for the male, celibate priesthood and the vowed religious life.

Curtiss argued that the so-called crisis is "precipitated and continued by people who want to change the church's agenda."

Dioceses that succeed in attracting new priests, Curtiss wrote, will be those that "promote orthodoxy and loyalty.'

Fr. Michael Gutgsell, chancellor of the Omaha archdiocese, said the article had first appeared in the archdiocesan newspaper, The Catholic Voice, and was reprinted in Our Sunday Visitor on Oct. 8.

Curtiss wrote that he is "personally aware" of vocation directors, teams and evaluation boards who make a "determined effort to discourage orthodox candidates' - men who oppose the possibility of women priests or who defend the church's opposition to artificial birth control or "who exhibit a strong piety toward certain devotions, such as the rosary."

Those directors, teams and boards, he said, have brought on the very gap they decry, even as they press for change in the church's requirement that priests be celibate men.

"And the same people who precipitate a decline in vocations by their negative actions call for the ordination of married men and women to replace the vocations- they have discouraged," Curtiss wrote. "They have a death wish for the ordained priesthood and vowed religious life as the church defines them."

"Negative actions," in Curtiss' view, include tolerating dissent about a male celibate priesthood, birth control and other church teachings.

Within the American hierarchy, Curtiss is a powerful opponent of dissent. A theology professor at St. Meinrad Seminary, Sr. Carmel McEnroy, was dismissed from her post in April after a committee of U.S. bishops led by Curtiss investigated the school in St. Meinrad, Ind. McEnroy had signed an open letter to Pope John Paul II calling for the church to eliminate its ban on women priests.

In a 1992 interview with National Catholic Reporter, he said he believes appreciation for celibacy as a life choice within the church is being renewed. Sociologists researching the background of the dramatic 30-year decline in vocations regard the celibacy requirement as a serious obstacle.

In his recent article, Curtiss said his views are based on "objective analysis" of dioceses where vocations are increasing.

Those include Arlington, Va., where, according to Curtiss, vocation director Fr. James Gould has an explanation for success.

It derives, in Gould's view, from "unswerving allegiance to the pope and magisterial teaching; perpetual adoration of the Blessed Sacrament in parishes, with an emphasis on praying for vocations; and the strong effort by a significant number of diocesan priests who extend themselves to help young men and women remain open to the Lord's will in their lives."

Arlington is one of a few Catholic dioceses - others include Peoria, Ill., and Omaha - where a traditionalist model of church, combined with aggressive recruiting, even beyond diocesan boundaries, has resulted in an increase m vocations.

Curtiss, through his chancellor, Gutgsell, declined to respond to questions arising from his article.

But critics have expressed serious doubts about the intellectual and psychological capacities of some of the conservative candidates, and about their ability to function effectively over time in a widely diverse and rapidly changing Catholic culture.

In his article, Curtiss said numbers of seminarians are fewer because the selection process drives good men away.

"I find young people everywhere in the archdiocese who want to be church with Pope John Paul," Curtiss wrote. "They want to know what the church teaches through its magisterium. They want to be part of the unity of the church and not caught up in dissent and disunity.

"Young people do not want to commit themselves to dioceses or communities that permit or simply ignore dissent from church doctrine," he wrote. "They do not want to be associated with people who are angry at the church's leadership or reject magisterial teaching. They do not want to be battered by agendas that are not the church's and radical movements that disparage their desire to be priests, religious or loyal lay leaders in the church."