Colloque

The Self-Understanding of the Parish Priest in the U.S.A.: An Overview of Twentieth Century Developments

Scott Appleby

Membre a labase

Scott Appleby

Résumé du colloque

In order to describe the attitude of American priests toward parochial ministry, I have divided the century into four discrete periods, each corresponding to a way of priestly ministry which commanded center stage in the ongoing struggle for identity. During the period from 1907 to 1954, the era of the "ombudsman", priestly ministry was centered in the parish and the priest's presence there was both symbolic and functional. His presence as a symbol of the institutional church and the divine Christ was absolute and unchallenged, and it lent substance to his claim to functional omniscience. During the initial period of updating, from 1954 to 1962, "home priests" reached the stage of life and recognized that the all-purpose parochial presence of the ombudsman was no longer possible nor desirable. They began to reconsider parochial presence in light of a renewed commitment to the larger secular world. The ensuing decade was by all accounts a period of crisis in religion and in the Church as in American society. During this decade there emerged a number of new approaches to priestly ministry, including the social activism of the "urban priest" and the professional specialisation of the so-called "hyphenated priest". These men reconsidered the symbolic identity of the priest in light of the conciliar decrees and forged new standards of priestly behavior, not their ability to integrate these symbolic and functional roles within the setting of the suburban parish, or within the organizational structures of any traditional parish was open to question. The current period reflects the emergence of a way of ministry which draws creatively upon previous examples: the priest as coordinator, supervisor, "orchestra leader". His symbolic presence, rather than his functional presence, lends distinctiveness to his ministry; better put, his symbolic presence is a primary function of his ministry. His home is once again in the parish, but his notion of his place in parish and world is somewhat different from that of his conterpart in the 1930s.