Bringing Catholic priests from abroad to minister in Ireland is not a workable solution to the vocations crisis, Fr Brendan Hoban of the Association of Catholic Priests has said. “They could empty our emptying churches in a decade,” he warned.
“Priests are not like footballers who can be transferred for a given fee from Real Madrid to Manchester United and hardly notice the change, as what they do and how and where they do is exactly the same. The size of the pitch and the width of the goal posts are the same in Madrid as in Manchester,” he said.
“Priesting is different. Language matters. Culture matters. Tradition matters. History matters. Understanding is about more than knowing the words. Appreciating the weave and waft of Irish society is essential to ministering to people’s needs at parish level,” he said.
Earlier this month two priests from Nigeria began ministry in Kilmore diocese, which covers most of Cavan and Leitrim, while it was announced last week that two further Nigerian priests will begin ministry in east Galway’s Clonfert diocese early next month. It has also emerged that Waterford diocese may be about to bring in a significant number of priests from India to minister there.
Context
Giving credibility to the strategy of bringing in priests from abroad was “the long and impressive missionary contribution of the Irish Church to Catholicism throughout the world”, said Fr Hoban.
In his Western People column he noted, "missioning in Africa or Asia a hundred years ago is different from missioning in Ireland now. The context is completely different."
Most difficult of all, he said, “is the perspective priests from other countries bring to their pastoral style. It used to be said about Pope John Paul that he tried to replicate Polish Catholicism throughout the world. And the problem with African or Indian priests, for example, is that they may try to replicate their own pastoral practices and cause more problems than they will solve.”
If priests “are used to not allowing laity to be involved in worship, how long will they survive in an Irish parish? If priests are used to not allowing women to be involved in parish life, except in a peripheral and patronising way, how long will they survive in an Irish parish? Or more to the point how long will an Irish parish survive them? They could empty our emptying churches in a decade,” he said.
