Archbishop’s Bishop Column

This weekend I shall have the privilege of ordaining 20 Permanent Deacons in the Cathedral for service in the Archdiocese of Port of Spain. I was pleased to learn that a number of Permanent Deacons from other (Arch)dioceses in the Caribbean, Europe and the United States will come to Trinidad to join the candidates for their ordination.

Programme Information

For the information of the Archdiocese, the candidates for the Permanent Diaconate have completed a long and demanding programme. To be eligible for the programme they were required to have three years of positive pastoral service in the parish that nominated them. They needed letters of recommendation from those who knew them for more than ten years.

They received the same psychological testing as the seminarians of the Archdiocese. If married, their wives had to agree to their admission into the programme. They were then interviewed by the Seminary Admissions Board which made a recommendation to me as Archbishop as to whether or not they should be admitted into the programme.

Once admitted, they completed three years of biblical, academic and pastoral studies along with courses in spiritual theology. They experienced retreats. I taught in the programme myself. Halfway through the programme, I personally interviewed each diaconal candidate along with his wife if the candidate was married. At the conclusion of the programme each candidate was evaluated and, once again, if married, the candidate’s wife had to agree to his ordination. Twenty four candidates entered the programme and twenty were approved for ordination.

Each candidate was asked to sign a Memorandum of Understanding which clarified issues of assignment expansion and financial matters especially if individual Permanent Deacons were assigned to full time employment in the Archdiocese.

Assignments of Permanent Deacons

The candidates will be assigned to the parish priests/administrators who nominated them because the people in these parishes already knew the candidates. Cases in which the parish priest was changed during the three year programme or a candidate moved to another parish during the programme were settled in dialogue with the new parish priest/administrator and the candidate.

Challenging News

Effective June 30, 2010, the Bishops will ‘suspend’ the Seminary Programme. There are a number of aspects of the Bishops’ decision that must be clarified for the general public and for those with specific interests e.g. the lay students in the School of Theology:

1)The Regional Seminary operates under the jurisdiction of the Conference of Bishops which is subject to Rome. The Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples appoints the Rector of the Regional Seminary.

During the last visit of the Bishops to Rome, the Cardinal Prefect of the Congregation, after studying the data on the Seminary and listening to the Bishops, asked the Bishops to consider closing the Regional Seminary temporarily, taking some time to establish a recovery programme and then reopen the Regional Seminary. After trying all possibilities to continue the Regional Seminary programme, the Bishops followed the advice of Rome. The decision was approved by the Papal Nuncio.

2)There are four elements to be addressed in the recovery programme: 1)improving the facilities; 2)increasing seminary enrollment; 3)increasing resident faculty; and 4)developing the financial base for the Regional Seminary. Obviously, number 2 implies more attention be given to vocation recruitment throughout the Antilles Episcopal Conference.

3)The Seminary to which the students from the English speaking Caribbean will be sent, Santo Tomas de Aquino Seminary in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, has the traditional four year philosophy programme after which the student earns a degree. The theology programme is also a four year programme at the end of which the student earns a second degree. The philosophy faculty numbers 24 resident members. The theology faculty numbers 22 resident members. There are two hundred students in the seminary.

4)The Bishops realize they have ethical responsibilities to the students at the School of Theology at the Regional Seminary. They have decided to continue the School of Theology for the students who are presently taking courses at the School of Theology. However, they will not accept new students in the programme.

As a result, the library at the Regional Seminary will be maintained and a library staff will be retained.

5)The Archdiocese of Port of Spain will have to study the possibility of continuing the School of Theology to protect the accreditation enjoyed by the School of Theology so that when the Regional Seminary reopens, the Regional Seminary programme will still be fully accredited. At the recommendation of the Dean at the Regional Seminary, dialogue will begin immediately between the faculty of the School of Theology and the faculty of Credi.

The only way the programme at the School of Theology can accept a new entrance class of lay students is if the present faculty at the School of Theology will agree to teach very small classes for the next three years and join the faculty for the Credi programme. Then the joint faculty can support both programmes. In this way, the present faculty at the School of Theology who agree to teach in the Credi programme (over 500 students) will actually teach more students than it ever did in the Seminary programme

Before making the decision to continue the School of Theology thereby continuing the collaboration with the University of the West Indies, the Archdiocese will also have to examine carefully the reasons for the ongoing annual deficit at the academic programme.
In addition, in dialogue with the people of the Archdiocese, the Archdiocese must decide whether it can assume the cost of the programme for the indefinite future.

In this context, during March the Archdiocese will be consulted about the wisdom of introducing an annual Archbishop’s Appeal to financially support the growing demands of Synod implementation, Cathedral restoration and significant expenses.

6)The Bishops will continue to raise funds for the Regional Seminary in their own (arch)dioceses as part of the recovery programme. More details will be available after the next meeting of the Bishops in April.

7)The full text of the Bishops Communique provided by the Executive Secretary of the Bishops’ Conference is attached to this column.

Conclusion

The ‘Good News, Challenging News’ that has been reported in this column raises some important issues. I conclude with these requests:

1)Pray for the newly ordained Permanent Deacons that they may serve the parishes of the Archdiocese well and, along with laypersons, provide support to the overworked priests of the Archdiocese;

2)Pray for the success of the temporary transition plan to move the students for the priesthood from the Antilles Episcopal Conference to Santo Domingo;

3)Prayerfully consider why there are so few vocations in the English speaking Caribbean. What is the explanation for the fact that the Hispanic Caribbean has 200 seminarians while the English speaking Caribbean has 8?

4)Appreciate more fully the practical importance of evangelization/new evangelization programmes for the (arch)dioceses of the English speaking Caribbean;

5)Accept the wakeup call contained in this transition without discouragement but with positive energy. As an Archdiocese, rise to the challenge of building the future together;

6)Think positively! There are opportunities in this transition. For example, we will eventually have bilingual priests in the Archdiocese to meet the growing needs of Hispanic ministry. There are also opportunities present for educating and forming Catholic laity for spirituality and pastoral care along with continuing to serve the ecumenical and interfaith needs of students at the University of the West Indies.