Speaking to The Tablet, the Archbishop of Armagh Eamon Martin paid tribute to Ireland’s “very generous, hard-working clergy who love what they are doing and like to be able to continue to contribute”.
But he acknowledged, “There has been a huge shift over the last 10 years especially, and a huge decline in the number of vocations to the priesthood.”
As a result, he said, “Our ability to provide access to the Eucharist and the Sacraments in the way that we did in the past when we had such a huge number of priests is no longer there.”
However, Archbishop Martin said that people should not lose hope. “We are beginning to enter into a new time for the Church in Ireland,” he said.
“I think rationalisation of the numbers of parishes, and indeed even the numbers of dioceses, is inevitable in the current situation. But it is not necessarily the death of something. We need to see it as igniting new life in the Church.”
He said the bishops would introduce catechists more widely in the next couple of years to help rebuild faith in communities.
Separately, the Archbishop of Dublin Dermot Farrell said there is “a major pastoral challenge” which will soon become “more acute” as the number of priests available for appointment in the archdiocese of Dublin “reduces sharply”.
Priest numbers in Dublin are expected to fall 70 per cent over the next 20 years from current levels, due to an ageing clergy, according to an actuarial assessment. Only two priests have been ordained in Dublin since 2020.
Also speaking to The Tablet, Archbishop Farrell acknowledged that the number of candidates for priesthood in recent years has been “remarkably small”.
“We need to become more intentional about fostering vocations,” he said, while fostering the service and ministry of all the baptised within a framework of co-responsibility.