Archbishop Timothy Broglio of the U.S. Archdiocese for the Military Services, washes the feet of a U.S. soldier in 2014 on Holy Thursday in Afghanistan at Shindand Air Base, located in Herat province. (CNS photo/courtesy of the Archdiocese for the U.S. Military Services)
Washington — This fall the U.S. Archdiocese for the Military Services plans to hold its first discernment gathering for Catholic priests to encourage them to consider becoming military chaplains. The archdiocese holds several retreats a year for young men who are thinking about the priesthood and the chaplaincy, but this will be the first event of its kind for ordained priests, because there is a critical shortage of chaplains. “The need for Catholic chaplains is enormous. We have one fourth of the military population and we only have 8 percent of the chaplain corps,” said Archbishop Timothy Broglio, who heads the military archdiocese. “So there is a tremendous scarcity of priests. This does not apply to all religious groups, however. It really only applies to Catholic priests and perhaps to a lesser extent to rabbis, but otherwise most of the Protestant groups are covered.” “For God and Country: A Call to Serve Those Who Serve” will be held Oct. 5-9 in Washington. Interested priests can apply for the all-expenses-paid gathering via the archdiocese’s website, www.milarch.org. It is open to priests already incardinated in a U.S. diocese or in a religious order and currently engaged in pastoral service. Attendees will stay in a Washington retreat house and the agenda will include visits to Joint Andrews Air Force Base, which is just outside of Washington; the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland; and Fort Belvoir and the Pentagon, which are both in Virginia. The priests also will concelebrate Mass in the Pentagon Memorial Chapel at the 9/11 crash site. A priest must get the permission of his bishop to serve in the military. As chaplains in the armed forces, priests are under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Archdiocese for the Military Services, based in Washington. “This upcoming discernment, it’s a moment of prayer, as obviously any discernment has to be,” Archbishop Broglio said in an interview with Catholic News Service. “And it’s also a moment of information, where we’ll try to help them understand what a chaplain does.” “It’s the first time, really, the archdiocese is engaging in this kind of an activity as an attempt to broaden our reach and our contact with priests throughout the United States and perhaps giving them an opportunity to explore this vocation within a vocation,” he added. In recent years, there has been a substantial decline in the number of Catholic military chaplains. A big part of it has to do with the military’s mandatory retirement age of 62, which leads to many having to step down from the role, even though there is often no one new to fill it. Since the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the number of active-duty chaplains has fallen from over 400 priests to 228. So now there is only one priest for every 1,300 Catholics in the U.S. military. “It’s a priority to get more priests to serve as chaplains because we can still double the amount of priests in the military chaplaincy” and still have a need, according to Deacon Michael Yakir, archdiocesan chancellor. Priests who seek to become a chaplain must meet certain qualifications, such as being physically fit and able to pass a medical exam, essentially to be able to deploy with the troops if need be. And according to military rules, they must be “under a certain age,” which varies depending on the branch. Both Archbishop Broglio and Deacon Yakir referred to the military chaplaincy as “a call within a call” — answering the call to serve God and the call to serve the troops.