I hope the print version of this Dayton Daily News story is better than the electronic version, because this thing just isn’t terribly coherent.
Basically, the parish currently in Springboro has a tiny building, and they’re building a bigger one because there’s so many people moving out there past the Dayton Mall and along 75 down towards Cincinnati. While they’re at it, the archdiocese has apparently decided to drag in another parish which I don’t know much about, which may or may not be growing or shrinking. But instead of talking about that expansion and talking to the members of both parishes, they’ve shoehorned it into a story about consolidating parishes that are losing members, and about priests retiring. Wha?
Needless to say, nobody mentions the huge seminarian classes coming in, because it’s not really a story about the actual state of anything.
Also, the headline says “Ohio Catholics,” but they don’t contact Columbus or Toledo or Steubenville — presumably because the news isn’t bad there, and they’re planting new parishes with all their new young priests. God forbid one should find out something that might mess up the story.
I don’t know if this is some kind of “the AP did a story so we have to do a story” thing. I don’t know whether the editor or the reporter is to blame here. But certainly the editor is the one who’s supposed to make sure a story makes sense to the reader. And is factual and balanced. And is not a waste of paper. A very poor job by the DDN.
19 January 2013 at 11:14 am
The DDN doesn’t want to let facts get in the way of the narrative. And oh by the way, the picture they have for the article is just precious. What religion is that again?
http://media.cmgdigital.com/shared/img/photos/2012/06/21/1f/2a/slideshow_883215_ddn020708ashwednesday4.jpg
It is kind of funny how the author of the article tried to use the story of the building of a larger church in St. Mary’s parish to demonstrate a priest shortage. Generally, the building of a larger church building is a story of vibrancy and growth, but instead it is flipped to show staleness and decline. St. Mary’s is located in FRANKLIN, and has been for 100+ years. The building is too small considering the growth not only in Franklin, but especially in neighboring Springboro. Most of the parish members nowadays were coming from Springboro, not Franklin. When they decided to build a new, larger buidling they picked the new location in Springboro. I’m impressed the parish was at peace with such a decision, given the rivalry between the white collar Springboro and blue collar Franklin. Apparently when the new “pastoral regions” were set up, the AoC also lumped St. Mary’s Franklin (soon-to-be Springboro) in with the parish in Waynesville. This seems to be the catalyst for the story.
Still, the DDN provides no context whatsoever, just driving a twenty year old narrative down your throat. The priest shortage, is most likely and by all indications, a generational blip, and the decline in the number of Catholics in the area is probably just a much an indication of declining population and fleeing population to southern/western/prosperous states from the state of Ohio as it is to a mass exit of Catholics. That mass exit already happened over the past 40 years. Nothing new there.
Once the Church is finished with its purification yes you will first see the numbers drop as we are seeing now, but eventually we will result with a smaller, but more fervent Church once all the dead weight (for a lack of a better term) dies off. Then the trend lines will stabilize and begin their upward trajectory, and in fact we are already seeing this, and that is what the DDN completely missed.
19 January 2013 at 12:06 pm
I go to St. Mary’s in Franklin sometimes. If I’m not feeling well on Sunday morning, I’m traveling or something comes up, I can still make the 6 PM at St. Mary’s. The building is old and seems to need repair, but it’s of an old style that is refreshing.
The 6 PM on Sunday night is typically packed. I think a lot of people in the area use it as a “last chance”. I understand that there’s a later one at the Univ. of Dayton, though.
19 January 2013 at 12:20 pm
Anyone registered for the comments there? I see the usual errors there. (Ordain women, let priests marry, dump the objections to contraception.)
20 January 2013 at 2:29 pm
You defense of the faith in the sesspool that is your runofthemill secular newspaper combox is courageous and inspiring. Keep up the good work.
20 January 2013 at 4:52 pm
Thanks. I think I’ll leave it be at this point keeping in mind psalm, “Blessed be the man who goeth not into the secular combox of the unrighteous.
19 January 2013 at 8:55 pm
I’m so glad you posted this. I saw that piece in the DDN and I could not make heads or tails of it!
20 January 2013 at 9:43 pm
What’s worse is that the Deacon’s Bench posted it as a good snapshot of our situation! I inform you, Deacon Kandra, that it stinks!
21 January 2013 at 9:35 am
“It’s local and national,” said Father Len Wenke of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati. “It is worldwide.”
Actually, it isn’t. As CB indicates, the current “shortage” is more likely a generational blip. And plenty of dioceses around the country don’t have any shortage to speak of. Moreover, the Church in Asia and Africa is experiencing a vocations boom.
26 January 2013 at 6:22 pm
In the parish we left in Hamilton, the priest in charge of that deanery (who is spear heading a ” pastoral region”) has said to many of the parishioners and parents that the days where as parish will have its own priest are going to be over, due to the priest shortage.