The growth and decline of the ordination rates to the Roman Catholic diocesan priesthood cross-nationally, 1950--2000

Since the early 1970s, the decline in vocations to the Roman Catholic diocesan priesthood in the United States has been the focus of extensive debate and research. While similar declines took place in some European nations, the overall pattern of decline in the number of diocesan ordinations in the US is not reflected in most other countries, especially in Africa, Latin America, and Asia. This research places the US pattern of vocations into a comparative cross-national perspective and sheds the light on the issue of the priest shortage in the US and the situation of the diocesan priesthood around the world. This study aims to describe the effects of organizational characteristics of the Catholic Church and the influence of national socio-economic conditions on diocesan ordination rates and on the population of diocesan priests between 1970 and 2000.; To accomplish this task, a unique data set was assembled on the organizational condition of the Catholic Church as well as information on national socio-economic characteristics for 1950 and for every year between 1970 and 2000 for 73 nations. Bivariate and multivariate regression analyses were conducted to assess the effects of these organizational and socio-economic characteristics on cross-national variation in a set of three dependent variables: the absolute number of diocesan ordinations, the ratio of diocesan ordinations to the Catholic population, and the ratio of diocesan priests to the Catholic population.; It was found that the overall change in the absolute number of diocesan ordinations was much greater in Africa, Latin America, and Asia. As expected, the overall increase in the number of Catholics and in the size of the population of diocesan priests was associated with an increase in the number of ordinations. In addition, countries which experienced a greater increase in national wealth and industrialization witnessed an overall decline in the number of diocesan ordinations over recent decades. Similarly, the overall change in the ratio of diocesan ordinations to the Catholic population was much greater among African and South American nations. A greater increase in national wealth and level of industrialization was also associated with lower ordinations-to-laity ratios. Countries with greater positive change in national wealth and level of industrialization witnessed an overall decline in the priests-to-laity ratio.