The bishop of Antwerp, Belgium, wrote in a pastoral letter that he will “make every effort to ordain married men as priests for our diocese by 2028.”
“The question is no longer whether the Church can ordain married men as priests, but when it will do so, and who will do it,” Bishop Johan Bonny wrote on March 20. “It is an illusion to think that a serious synodal-missionary process in the West still has a chance without also ordaining married men as priests.”
“There is a historical shortage of local priests in many dioceses,” he added. “The number of unmarried men who want to become priests has fallen to just above zero.”