Vatican Questions Bishop After Talk With Married Ex-Priests : Catholics: The head of the Priestly Life and Ministry Committee, who received the query, said he was not criticized for the meeting last summer.

A ranking Vatican official has raised questions about a meeting last summer in Santa Clara of U.S. Catholic bishops with married ex-priests whose organization advocates their return to priestly service.

Cardinal Antonio Innocenti, who heads the Vatican Congregation for the Clergy, wrote to Bishop Donald Wuerl of Pittsburgh. Wuerl and three fellow bishops talked on June 24 with five leaders of a national organization called CORPUS (Corps of Reserve Priests United for Service).

Wuerl, attending a monthlong international synod of bishops in Rome, confirmed Thursday that he received a letter but said there was nothing critical in its tone or content.

“It was a request for information about what happened,” Wuerl said. “I am not comfortable with any other interpretation of it.”

U.S. sources at the synod say that Wuerl told the Vatican he listened to the former priests and responded by asserting the official celibacy line in what was an amicable discussion.

The Vatican has tried repeatedly in recent years to avoid giving any credence to speculation, especially in North America, that the church may have to end mandatory celibacy in order to remedy the growing shortage of priests.

Pope John Paul II made it clear before the international synod of bishops on priestly life, scheduled to close Sunday, that a married priesthood and celibacy were not on the agenda. However, the topics have been broached by several bishop delegates.

The U.S. bishops held a June retreat at Santa Clara University while about 100 CORPUS members and their wives were meeting at nearby San Jose State University. Wuerl agreed to an informal meeting with the ex-priests.

At a news conference after the 75-minute meeting, Wuerl said: “I think there’s everything to be gained by conversation, even if you’re discussing . . . issues you disagree on.”

Wuerl, who chairs the bishops’ Priestly Life and Ministry Committee, was accompanied by three members of that committee: Bishops Pierre DuMaine of San Jose, John Favalora of St. Petersburg, Fla., and John Marshall of Burlington, Vt.

Cincinnati Archbishop Daniel Pilarczyk, president of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, wrote to all U.S. bishops last summer, notifying them that the discussion took place and that the Vatican had also been informed.

“Apparently, Rome saw red flags raised by this meeting,” Terence Dosh, Minneapolis-based national coordinator for CORPUS, said this week.

“We had asked for a permanent liaison with the bishops’ priestly life committee and a chance to address the bishops as a group,” Dosh said. “Basically, their response was that they would take the request to their full committee.”

CORPUS President Anthony T. Padovano said he feared that the Vatican letter may discourage further contacts between bishops and local groups of married ex-priests.

However, Dosh disagreed. “It’s too late to nip it in the bud,” he said.

In the last three years, Dosh said, at least 15 bishops have met with married ex-priests in dioceses such as Seattle, San Antonio, Brooklyn, Indianapolis, Billings, Mont., and Corpus Christi, Tex.

“There are 25 to 30 bishops who already have married ex-priests in various pastoral ministry jobs--directors of religious education, theology teachers on campuses, parish administrators and chaplains in hospitals or hospices,” Dosh said. Ex-priests are able to use their experience in ministering even though they are functioning as laymen, he said.

CORPUS officials estimate that there are about 19,000 clergy who have left the priesthood in this country to get married. At least 80% of those belonging to CORPUS, which has 5,500 members, say they are willing to serve as priests again if the Vatican changes its policies, Dosh said.

During the synod in Rome this month, Brazilian Cardinal Aloisio Lorscheider disclosed in an interview that two married men recently were ordained in Brazil with Vatican approval.

One of the priests, though still married, reportedly has lived apart from his wife for more than a decade. The other submitted medical records showing that his wife, with whom he lives, is unable to have sexual relations because of medical complications resulting from childbirth years ago. The couple also had to sign papers pledging celibacy.

The disclosure is really “embarrassing” to the Vatican, Dosh said. “It makes the institutional church look foolish--to make those kinds of demands for fear of sex,” he said.

That contrasts, he contended, with the nearly 50 married Anglican and Episcopal clergy in this country who Rome has allowed to become Catholic priests while remaining married.

Times staff writer William Montalbano contributed to this story from Rome.