2/3 of Roman Catholic Churches in Baltimore to close

[barnhart]

My only experience with a priest was actually a priest in training, taking classes in college where I met him. He quite aggressively offered to give me a ride home, and once I actually accepted. Then he pressed to come in, which I did NOT allow. I kept my distance after that.

[Judas Maccabeus]

The obvious blame is on the seminary system itself. A healthy congregation produces its own leaders.

I have attended quite a number of Catholic churches over the years. I don't recall ever attending a single one where the priest was even from the same region let alone same country as the congregants. Working backwards:

Here in SW Washington the local priest of the church we take my mother-in-law to when she is in town is a recent transplant from India.

Back in Waco there were two Catholic churches we sometimes attended when family was in town. One had a Polish priest, the other was from India as well.

In Juneau Alaska the priest who was supposed to marry us turned out to be a recycled pedophile priest that had been relocated to Juneau from somewhere in the east coast. Maybe Boston? Until he was discovered and then he fled in the middle of the night, reportedly to Arizona and then points south.

The priest at the church in Santiago Chile where my mother-in-law attends is from Italy

The priest in the town where I lived in Guatemala was from upstate New York.

etc., etc., etc.

That has to be deliberate policy on the part of the Catholic church. It brings to mind how the army operated in Guatemala in the 1980s when I was working down there. The Guatemalan army was almost 100% focused on maintaining internal order and fighting internal insurgencies. There was frankly no thought or planning for war against Mexico, El Salvador, or Honduras. During the 1980s there was some idle right-wing political talk of Guatemala reclaiming Belize which was a former Guatemalan province in the 19th Century. Mostly because the military government wanted a patriotic distraction from what they were doing at home. But the British response to Argentina mostly put an end to that talk. Even so, Guatemalan maps published at that time showed Belize as a province of Guatemala. And the British had a battalion of British marines stationed in Belize as more or less a tripwire to prevent any Guatemalan adventurism.

Anyway, there were Army bases scattered across Guatemala that were inwardly focused on patrolling the district in which they were located. So the practice was that the local army base was responsible for recruitment in that region (often brutally by simply kidnapping kids off the street and hauling them back to the base. But once enlisted they would ALWAYS ALWAYS be sent to a region across the country. The army wanted no soldiers working in their home province where they might speak the local language and have local family in the local villages where they might be patrolling (and committing atrocities). They wanted their soldiers to be as foreign to the area they were stationed as possible. The better to maintain discipline and such.

I have wondered if the Catholics are operating on some sort of similar mindset. Where they can't have priests who are too vested in a local community actually serve in that community because they might be more loyal to the local congregation than to Rome. It is the only explanation that actually makes sense.

I suspect it is because they have a severe shortage of America’s sons, and have to import to fill the gap. A posting to the US likely seems attractive to an Indian with dirt floors. Might get a green card in the deal as well.

[Ken]

I suspect it is because they have a severe shortage of America’s sons, and have to import to fill the gap. A posting to the US likely seems attractive to an Indian with dirt floors. Might get a green card in the deal as well.

But it is the same everywhere though. For example, if the US is short of priests, why are they sending them to Latin America and sending Latin American priests to the US?

It also occurs to me that perhaps some of the official Catholic opposition to birth control has always been to produce surplus men and women to fill out the ranks of nuns and priests.

[Judas Maccabeus]

I suspect it is because they have a severe shortage of America’s sons, and have to import to fill the gap. A posting to the US likely seems attractive to an Indian with dirt floors. Might get a green card in the deal as well.

But it is the same everywhere though. For example, if the US is short of priests, why are they sending them to Latin America and sending Latin American priests to the US?

It also occurs to me that perhaps some of the official Catholic opposition to birth control has always been to produce surplus men and women to fill out the ranks of nuns and priests.

I suspect that the US is receiving far more than it is sending.

[HondurasKeiser]

I suspect it is because they have a severe shortage of America’s sons, and have to import to fill the gap. A posting to the US likely seems attractive to an Indian with dirt floors. Might get a green card in the deal as well.

But it is the same everywhere though. For example, if the US is short of priests, why are they sending them to Latin America and sending Latin American priests to the US?

It also occurs to me that perhaps some of the official Catholic opposition to birth control has always been to produce surplus men and women to fill out the ranks of nuns and priests.

I suspect that the US is receiving far more than it is sending.

The local bishop here in La Ceiba is from Ireland and a few of the priests are from other parts of Latin America.

[Ken]

But it is the same everywhere though. For example, if the US is short of priests, why are they sending them to Latin America and sending Latin American priests to the US?

It also occurs to me that perhaps some of the official Catholic opposition to birth control has always been to produce surplus men and women to fill out the ranks of nuns and priests.

I suspect that the US is receiving far more than it is sending.

The local bishop here in La Ceiba is from Ireland and a few of the priests are from other parts of Latin America.

My point exactly. Ireland has as big or bigger of a priest shortage as the US https://www.euronews.com/2023/11/27/a-c ... g-replaced but they are shipping them to Honduras and then probably bringing Indian priests to Ireland. It is a global game of musical chairs that basically means few priests have any connection to the communities in which they are posted.