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FRANCE-CHURCH Dec-22-2006 (920 words) xxxi
French parishes count on foreign priests to preserve the faith
By Jonathan Luxmoore
Catholic News Service
LAUZERTE, France (CNS) -- On a cobbled back street of this hilltop town in France's rural Quercy region, a 45-year-old priest tidies the papers on his desk at the rectory and prepares for Mass at the nearby medieval basilica.
When Father Joseph Longo arrived from the Democratic Republic of Congo, he planned to stay a few months to complete his studies.
Three years later, he is one of a growing number of resident foreign priests who are helping preserve the church's life in this traditionally Catholic country.
"As an African, I'm surprised at the indifference toward religion here," Father Longo told Catholic News Service. "But there's plenty of good will and a lot of lay participation. I've had no problems being accepted."
Born at Kasay in what was then Zaire, Father Longo studied philosophy in the capital, Kinshasa, and was ordained in 1991 in the Luebo Diocese, working 12 years in a local parish.
He came to France in 2003 to finish a doctorate on German philosopher Immanuel Kant, but was quickly asked by Bishop Bernard Housset of Montauban to help out in his diocese in southwestern France, which had only two priestly ordinations in 2005 and just one in 2004.
As rector of Lauzerte, Father Longo is in charge of 19 parishes, visiting each every two months.
Around 100 attend his Sunday Mass at the 13th-century St. Barthelemy Church on Lauzerte's main square, the Place des Cornieres, with larger numbers turning out for festivals such as All Saints' Day.
He admitted he has faced problems adapting to the French culture and lifestyle.
Like most of the country's ancient churches, the basilica is owned and maintained by the town commune, which has to be consulted about its use.
Although some lay Catholics are deeply committed and pastorally active, most locals are secular in outlook and keep their distance from the church.
"Although European culture is based on Christian values, the daily reality looks quite different," the priest said. "But the town mayor, who symbolically handed me the church keys at my installation, is a parish council member, and I've good relations with the local council. I'm happy to stay as long as I'm needed."
When representatives of the Council of European Bishops' Conferences met in neighboring Spain in late September to discuss pastoral care for immigrants, they acknowledged that the continent's church was being "renewed and enriched" by people from "other cultures and religious traditions."
That could be especially true in France, where less than 10 percent of Catholics attend Sunday Mass and 40 percent of the population of 59 million denies any faith.
While the country's population has risen by a third since 1945, the number of Catholic priests has dropped by two-thirds, reaching 22,855 in 2004, a decline especially marked among diocesan clergy.
As vocations dwindle, ordinations are becoming rarer too, with just 135 new priests nationwide in 2004, and 121 the year before.
This has generated a need for outside help.
"Priests have always ended up in France for various reasons, but more and more are arriving now as pastors in agreed exchanges," said Father Maurice Pivot, director of the French Pontifical Missionary Works office.
"African dioceses have made gestures for the centenary or 150th anniversary of their creation by sending priests to the dioceses from which their first missionaries came. It's been a sign of the church's catholic dynamic," he said.
The number of foreign clergy working in French parishes increased sixfold in the five years between 1997 and 2002. This year the number reached 1,060, two-thirds of whom are from outside Europe, mostly from France's former colonies in Africa and Vietnam.
Some are assigned to African and Asian communities who make up about 4 percent of the country's population, but the majority are ministering among ordinary French Catholics.
From the study of his rectory on Lauzerte's Rue de la Barbacane, Father Longo gazes over an ancient landscape of sleepy farms and vineyards, a far cry from the political instability and tribal tensions of Congo.
The town, fortified against English invaders in the Middle Ages, stands between Cahors and Moissac on the traditional pilgrimage route to Santiago de Compostela in northern Spain, and up to 3,000 pilgrims stop here each year to pray at the nearby pilgrims' garden.
Father Longo admits the local church's practical prospects look bleak.
Lauzerte's famous Clarissan convent was turned into a police station during the French Revolution, and its only other convent, inhabited by three elderly Daughters of Jesus, closed two years ago.
The Montauban Diocese plans to cut costs by selling the building and the adjacent rectory as well. Although there were 14 Catholic marriages and 12 baptisms in the town last year, there were many more funerals.
Despite this, Father Longo is hopeful. What the church lacks in local enthusiasm is being partly made up with support from abroad.
Lauzerte's basilica has an English organist and German choirmaster, and Dutch and Belgians in its congregation. Local French Catholics know their world is changing and that their church may well be saved by devout minorities, he said.
"My own country was evangelized by French missionaries, and their work is bearing fruit as we now bring the faith back to France," Father Longo told CNS.
"The French aspire to total freedom, and this has been expressed in a crisis of faith. But there's fervor among young people, and I've no doubt the faith will recover."
END
Copyright (c) 2006 Catholic News Service/USCCB. All rights reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed.
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