Catholic priests have expressed serious concern about the visitation team’s proposal that seminarians in Maynooth should spend more time separated from other students if they are to achieve "a well-founded, priestly identity".
Seminary buildings must be used exclusively by seminarians, the Vatican team argued in their report, and more consistent admission criteria must also be used when men are seeking to enter the priesthood.
The apostolic visitation report also recommends that the dioceses and seminary decide together who are suitable candidates.
At present, the dioceses make the decision to accept a man for priestly training and he is then sent to the seminary, which can choose to reject him if it believes he is not of the correct character type.
The Vatican team also warned that more attention needed to be paid to the "intellectual formation of seminarians" and that their pastoral training must be re-evaluated to ensure there was sufficient emphasis on preparing priests to "celebrate the sacraments".
The Association of Catholic Priests, which welcomed much of the report, said it did not "welcome any suggestion that seminarians should be cut off from their peers".
At the launch of the report yesterday, Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin denied the move was about isolating seminarians.
"It isn’t a cloistered life," he said.
"The seminarians here at St Patrick’s College, for example, spend the vast majority of their time with other students. But in a seminary there must always be that space for prayer and reflection... It’s not about closing and locking up the seminarians."
Cardinal Sean Brady said seminarians themselves have sought their own space.
"That request has come time and time again from the seminarians themselves," he said. "And you must think how often they are away from the seminary in their parishes and so on."
However, Fr Brendan Hoban of the Association of Catholic Priests said his group was concerned that the Vatican was "trying to recreate the pre-Vatican Council situation".
"We would believe that there is a need for priests to listen to communicate with their peers and be aware of the signs of the times," he said.
"During my training in the 1960s, we would have been encouraged to mingle and discuss issues with other students. Anything else is going in the wrong direction. Priests should not be isolated from society."
The bishop of Cork and Ross, John Buckley, said the Lord himself told the early disciples to come away to a quite place when they were following him. He said the seminary must afford students the opportunity to pray and reflect.
"But at the same time, students must be involved in parish and diocesan life and encountering people and the culture of today," he said.
"In that regard, all seminarians today engage in pastoral work organised through the seminary during the academic year and by the diocese during the summer holiday. This is a vital part of formation."