On Canon Law with Father Crane: Extend grace as you consider priests’ unique duties and burdens

When seminarians identify me as a canon law nerd, they often ask the question: “Father, what is your favorite canon?” Since they are seminarians, I answer:

“c. 247 §2 The seminarians should appropriately receive firm teachings regarding the duties and burdens lived by sacred ministers of the Church, with no difficulty of the priestly life having been left unsaid.”

This is intuitive. These men should be aware of what they are getting into. However, contemporary experience suggests that it is a very difficult obligation to fulfill. Much of the Church’s implicit assumptions regarding the pastoral structures no longer apply in the contemporary, Midwestern context.

For 500 years, all the Church’s law, all of her pastoral planning and all of her exercise of pastoral care have been structured around the assumption of one parish, meeting at one church, served by one pastor. With 131 parishes in the Diocese of St. Cloud, and all of those having at least one church, this structure simply doesn’t exist for the roughly 50 priests in parochial assignments in the diocese.

Yet, when the seminaries present hypotheticals to seminarians, when diocesan or parish leadership hatches a plan or tallies contributions, even when priests preach in one particular church or another, everyone speaks as if the old one-to-one-to-one model still applies. Indeed, I would challenge anyone reading this article to consider how often he or she recalls his or her pastor preaching about “my parishes” or even the more inclusive “our parishes.” Isn’t it much more often stated in the singular: “our parish,” “our church”?

Similarly, only a century ago, priests were assigned to one parish or other for the entirety of their earthly lives. Indeed, this is the presumed universal model for good pastoral care in the Church — pastors are to be assigned to one particular parish, indefinitely. No one is moved, unless someone retires or dies. However, with an eye to sharing the gifts of fewer priests as broadly as possibly, moves are more frequent, with the most complex assignment given to the youngest, most recently ordained, in the hope he might have the energy for it.

In my experience, it takes a special effort to recognize these things, because even without living in it for the whole time, we have the collective experience of 500 years telling us that the model is one-to-one-to-one.
A variation from that model for the last 50 years barely even registers in our collective psyche. A joint bulletin or an “ACC event” is but a tiny stick thrown into the raging river of tradition and experience that carries the Church through the centuries.

Still, to support priests, please make the special effort to consider the man’s unique duties and burdens “in this place and at this moment.” It makes sense that a priest who has been moved to a three-or-more parish cluster every two years for the first nine years of his priesthood does not necessarily prioritize one parish over the others for which he’s equally responsible, nor does he know names as well as your last pastor did, who was there for 12 years, or even 20.

As exciting as it is to have three rectories to oneself, it is also lonely, and it’s more difficult in some ways than it was for the priest who never had to leave the parish campus. It doesn’t immediately solve the problems, but if we can just consider these things and acknowledge them, what a difference it would make! “Father, how are your parishes?” Or, even better, “How are our parishes?”

Father Matthew Crane is the vicar of canonical affairs for the Diocese of St. Cloud.

Pictured above: Father Matthew Crane (Dianne Towalski / The Central Minnesota Catholic)