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Fr. Seth's Important Bulletin Column for Sept. 5 & 12
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I am writing this for two weeks in part due to Labor Day bulletin deadlines, but largely in part due to the seriousness of the topic on which I’d like to speak. That is the health of priests in the Diocese of Duluth.Most of you recall that we had a seminarian with us this summer, Jacob Toma. At the end of the summer Jacob was required by the seminary to fill out a self-evaluation. One of the questions was about things he learned. Jacob spoke about positive things he learned from me as well as all of you, our parishioners, but he also said that he learned that there are a lot of responsibilities that priests have, and that – in his opinion – something needs to change, because there have been a lot of priests whom he has known who have had to take leaves of absence or have left the priesthood altogether.
As I read that statement from Jacob it made me think about all I have seen in my nine years of priesthood. Certainly there have been a handful of early retirements scattered throughout my last nine years, but there have been other more serious losses in our presbyterate over the years. In fact every year since 2015 we have had at least one – sometimes several – unexpected losses of priests.
These unexpected losses have ranged from death, to debilitating illness, to priests needing to take extended leaves of absence to deal with mental health issues, burnout, or other personal issues, to men leaving the priesthood altogether. Certainly, death and serious illness – though devastating in their own ways – are things that many times are not preventable. However, for the other losses (long term leaves of absence, and men leaving the priesthood), the question needs to be asked, what should we be doing differently?
The “we” in that statement I think applies to the priests themselves, to the leadership in the diocese, and also the faithful. I am not writing this article to give solutions to this question, but rather to propose the question as something for all of us to bring to prayer. Pray for our priests, pray for our Bishop and other diocesan leadership, and pray for all parishioners that the Lord may show us the path forward and that we accept the path He shows us.
I write this bulletin article on August 31st, 2021. By tomorrow, September 1st, 2021, an email will be going out to all priests that there has been yet another unexpected loss of a brother priest. Certainly the question of what do we do now to fill the parishes that this priest was serving will come to the floor, and that is very important to resolve. We have tried to resolve these things in part with our diocesan strategic plan, but we have done everything in that plan and more, and yet we still can’t seem to get ahead with numbers of priests. Maybe more will need to be done with parishes, but even more importantly, I think the core question that needs to be answered is how do we address the health of our priests (physical, mental, and spiritual)?
This isn’t too big for Jesus to handle. Let us entrust ourselves to His Sacred Heart, and ask Him for the grace to act in accordance with His Holy Will. God Bless. – Fr. Seth
This bulletin article will be for both the week of September 5th and September 12th.
