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	Dublin Archdiocese Seeks to Rezone 20 Surplus Properties By Olivia Kelly Irish Times May 31, 2010 http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/frontpage/2010/0531/1224271506070.html DUBLIN'S CATHOLIC archdiocese has applied for 20 properties and lands to be rezoned for residential development. They had become "surplus to requirements" due to the decline in Mass attendances and numbers of priests, it told Dublin City Council. The properties include two churches but are mainly presbyteries and parochial houses which, generally, are located in the same grounds as churches and schools. The move is likely to be replicated in other Catholic dioceses which are experiencing the same decline. More parishes are being clustered in dioceses as a practical way of addressing these trends. In April last year, Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin said that there were 10 times more priests over 70 than under 40 in the archdiocese. Last November, he said that "in a very short time, we will just have the bare number of priests required to have one active priest for each of our 199 parishes". He said "the future will require different structures and different planning. Parishes will have to work more closely with each other and share facilities. The number of Masses will have to be rationalised." In its submission to Dublin City Council, the archdiocese noted that a 2009 Red C poll found that weekly Mass attendance had slipped to 46 per cent in Ireland. It said, however, that the archdiocese had recently conducted its own survey and, while this has yet to be processed, it "suggested that even lower numbers were going to Mass each week". Anecdotally, priests in Dublin say weekly Mass attendance levels are as low as 2 and 3 per cent in some working-class areas of the city although figures for middle-class areas were holding up. Meanwhile, the average age of the Irish Catholic priest today is put at 63, while that for priests in religious congregations is in the early 70s. Priests retire at 75. Such is the situation that, writing in the Furrow magazine last June, Fr Brendan Hoban, parish priest at St Muredach's Cathedral, in Ballina, Co Mayo, said of his own Killala diocese that "in 20 years' time, there will be around eight priests instead of the present 34, with probably two or three under 60 years of age". He said "the difficult truth is that priests will have effectively disappeared in Ireland in two to three decades". There is no suggestion in the Dublin archdiocese's submission to the city council that its desire to have these properties rezoned is related to the clerical child sex abuse crisis. The archdiocese, in its update on such costs last November, said "settlement of claims is running at around €11 million (€7.6 million in settlements and €3.4 million in legal costs for both sides). The diocese has spent in the region of €6 million in child protection and related services."
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