As a result of the general decline in church attendance among the young and the ongoing sex abuse scandal involving priests, the Catholic Church is experiencing a serious reduction of young men entering the seminary and young women entering the convent.

U.S. Catholic Church officials are conducting an intensified campaign to reverse the plunge in Catholics pursuing religious vocations. In the United States last year, 454 priests were ordained, down from 994 in 1965. In that period, the U.S. Catholic population swelled from 45 million to nearly 65 million, leaving 3,251 parishes without priests. The number of nuns dropped from 179,954 to 68,634.

For now, priests and nuns are being imported from countries, such as Vietnam and Nigeria, that have rising seminary populations and more conservative religious cultures. But the longer-term strategy requires deciphering the themes that will pull in young American Catholics. And churches' recruitment drives increasingly are focused on 'how to be happy'.

"Fishers of Men," a 20-minute video released this month by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, presents priests as handsome and heroic, appearing in scenes of war and civil rights marches that are contrasted with the image of bored-looking people riding an escalator to meaningless jobs. The video will be shown at Catholic schools, churches and religious retreats around the country.

Recent local campaigns have played off the same idea, using posters, pamphlets and newspaper ads to show that priests are anything but lonely and isolated. One of them features the slogan "Life's Great in Black and White" and a photo of a group of young priests smiling and laughing. Other churches have picked up the catchphrase "Men in Black," using it on posters riffing off the Hollywood movie or as the name of a team of priests who travel to parishes to shoot hoops and talk about their work.

"A lot of young people think our lives are dreadful and boring. . . . We need to get a different image out to young people and parents," said the Rev. Jason Jalbert, associate director of vocations at the Catholic diocese in Manchester, N.H., and creator of the "Life's Great" campaign.

Attracting people to a religious vocation means knowing what the average American faces and offering an alternative, said the Rev. Brian G. Bashista, 41, a former architect who runs the Arlington Diocese's Vocations Office.
(statistics from the Washington Post)
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COMMENTS
This sounds like American armed forces recruitment....'A Few Good Men', 'Uncle Sam Wants You'. And what happens when the smiling young men shooting hoops discover that there is little room for creativity and fun in serving mass and hearing confession?

The church's campaign reminds me of the beginning of the movie, "Private Benjamin", where the widowed Goldie Hawn arrives at basic training and announces to the drill instructor that she wants ".....the army with the sailboats and condos." She had been lured by the recruiter's false promises and the posters depicting an unrealistic good life.

I think the church should avoid false advertising and take their campaign back to basics by acknowledging the problems and seeking committed and dedicated young men and women to help the church rebuild on an even stronger foundation. Instead of preppy priests playing basketball, portray them as new St. Peters with the goal of strengthening the church.

In view of the decline in church attendance, none of this is surprising. In any other profession one would suggest improving pay and condiions ...

Priests take a vow of poverty and are not 'paid', though, like nuns, all of their basic needs are met by the church.

As I understand it, the vow of celebacy is here to stay. This seems to be the main condition that those in and out of the religious life want to change. Supposedly, the Catholic Church defines priests as the direct descendants of the 12 disciples who remained unmarried. To change the celebacy requirement changes the definition and placement of the priest in the church hierarchy.

Yeess...but since church tradition ranks above even scripture [ I am told by my catholic friends] wouldn't that open the door to alter or do away with the celibacy factor in some way?
Remember - Vatican II altered an awful lot of things that people thought would never change.

Thanks, CD. It's also my undertanding that the celibacy of Roman Catholic priests is a matter of custom and practice, not of faith or doctrine. Moreover, from time to time exceptions have been allowed.

That certainly seems to be the case, bloomsby...Attitudes towards married clergy have evolved over time. It's weird that at one point after the modern attitude took over, the incidence of priests keeping mistresses was so high that it was argued that priests should definitely be allowed to marry, so that they wouldn't have to live in sin.

I don't think this new campaign will have the desired effect...it probably won't attract the kind of people the church is looking for. Looks as though the Catholic Church is in for a toughie: allow priests to ditch mandatory celibacy, or ordain women. Hmm.