Source: https://cruxnow.com/church/2015/06/16/its-time-to-reset-our-pastoral-strategy-ordain-married-men/
Accessed: 9/14/19
From text:
One immediate avenue could be to call select men from among married deacons to priesthood. The Catholic Church in the United States today has some 18,725 ordained deacons, 94% of them married men and 12,358 of them in their 50s and 60s, according to CARA’s 2013-14 study for the USCCB. A few single and/or widowed permanent deacons have taken additional training, become priests within a few years, and are serving well. The same could be done with select married permanent deacons, individuals of proven qualities discerned apt to serve as priests, able and willing to do so.
If just 10% of our 18,725 permanent deacons were discerned and called to priesthood in the next few years, the looming disaster of losing 50% of currently active priests to retirement would be alleviated - not sufficiently, but somewhat. That could provide breathing space for the Church to train and prepare many other married men willing to serve as priests.
Such priests would not have to be full-time Church employees. Many, if not all, could be tent-maker clergy, maintaining their careers and day jobs, as was St. Paul and as are most permanent deacons today.
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