Priests Divide Their Time

Father Timothy Dyer rises early, at 5:30 in the dark hours of the morning, to pray. As pastor of two churches, his days are so packed from beginning to end shepherding his blended flock that it’s often the only private time he finds for the God who he feels called him to serve.

The Archdiocese of Los Angeles has an estimated Roman Catholic population of more than 4 million and only 1,000 priests to minister to them--fewer than the number of priests two generations ago when the Catholic population was one-tenth its current size.

“We must be open to new and creative ways to serve our people and parishes,” Cardinal Roger M. Mahony said in a recent open letter.

One effort to relieve the shortage is the clustering, or blending, of parishes, for which a team of priests shares responsibilities.

Such is the task of Dyer and his associate pastor, Father Michael Gutierrez.

The Church of the Nativity and St. Columbkille’s Church, only 1 1/2 miles apart, were combined in 1997.

A look at the priests’ schedule shows the result:

Saturday begins with a 7:30 a.m. Mass at Church of the Nativity, followed by an 8 a.m. Mass at St. Columbkille. At 10:30, one of the priests presides over scheduled weddings or quinceanera celebrations at St. Columbkille; each church schedules baptisms at noon. The afternoon is equally crowded--weddings at 1:30 at Nativity, 3 at St. Columbkille, confession at both churches at 4.

Sunday repeats the pattern, with eight separate celebrations of the Mass at the two churches scheduled between 7:30 a.m. and noon--five in Spanish, three in English. The afternoon is taken up with parish committee meetings.

Added to these duties are home visits to the sick, prenuptial counseling for couples, hospital and prison visits, meetings with various groups and committees, and funeral services.

“I see them sometimes and they look so worn out,” said Lydia Aguirre, the weekend parish secretary who manages the priests’ formidable schedules.

At a recent baptism at St. Columbkille, Dyer rushed in from visiting parishioners to find that the woman who ordinarily prepared for services hadn’t arrived, a rare occurrence, he said. So he set up the resurrection candle, water to be blessed for the service and two kinds of holy oil, then donned his vestments.

Ordinarily he would have 10 babies and their families, but that day it was just Jason, Kevin and Maria Rosario.

Because there are no formal altar servers, he invited a young boy and girl to come forward from the congregation, one to hold the oil and one the missal. When it was time to bless the water, he called all the children to hold their hands over the bowl with him and guided them through the ceremony, using it as an opportunity to teach. One small boy ran back to get his mother to hold him up so he too could reach.

Within the press of scheduled functions, Dyer still makes time for home visits, which he describes as his “favorite thing.”

He makes at least six per week. “I prefer to go to their houses than to just sit in the office,” he said of his parishioners. He drops in or visits by invitation, to get acquainted, talk about family members in jail, teenagers in gangs, and people who are not coming to church anymore.

“It really grounds me in where the people are coming from,” he said.

Where they are coming from is changing, gradually but insistently--African Americans from the South, Latinos from Mexico and El Salvador and Belize.

“We have a chance to really build bridges here,” Dyer said. “I welcome the mix. That’s what catholic means--universal.”

Keeping up that sort of pace can be a strain, said Msgr. Richard Loomis, vicar for clergy--the archdiocese’s priest to the priests.

The strain is most apparent in places like South-Central Los Angeles, where older church buildings can’t hold many people. As a result, he said, churches are holding more services.

“Under ordinary circumstances, before the population explosion, a priest would ordinarily offer one to two Sunday Masses. Now it’s rare to find a parish with fewer than three, and sometimes it’s more than that,” Loomis said.

Dyer used to be vicar of clergy, but he said he prefers to be a pastor. He’s excited about the clustering of parishes because it gives him an opportunity to be creative. And, he said, serving two churches is “twice as much fun.”

“It’s kind of an enjoyable challenge. There’s no blueprint for how to do it. It’s new and creative. I kind of like the challenge,” he said.

Dyer, at 50, is concerned that the vow of celibacy and the church’s stand against ordaining women--two factors often cited by analysts--are not the only things keeping young men from joining the priesthood. The average age of priests in America is 58, and 24% of diocesan priests are over 70, the average retirement age, according to church statistics.

“Young people are not going to be attracted to something that’s only got old men in it,” he said.

The image of priests is another concern for him.

“Some people have strange ideas about priests. They think we were born with black socks on.”

Dyer would like to see a less isolated priesthood, which would mean working more closely with the community, being less cloaked in mystery and more accessible to those who might be drawn, by example, to serve.

“Some places in this country, they’re trying to draw people by putting priests on a pedestal, exalting the position to the point where your station is elevated--and that’s why they should be priests.

“I want to see people attracted to the foot-washing priesthood, a service priesthood, not an elite corps of sacred professionals who kind of call the shots and stand above the people. Jesus led with his faith and courage, not from a position of honor.

“For me it’s a privilege to be a priest. But we are not called to be men of privilege,” he said.

Dyer, whose father was a salesman for a religious goods company, chose his vocation when he was about 6. He was inspired by reading a children’s biography of John Bosco, the first “big book” he ever read.

“It had a picture of him. I wrote on the back of the picture, ‘God, help me to be a priest.’ ”

Gutierrez, by contrast, first heard the call to service in high school, but thought he liked girls too much to ever become a priest. He was at Cal State Fullerton majoring in pre-law when he finally decided to take up his vocation, transferring to St. John’s Seminary in Camarillo.

“I remember my neighbors taking bets on how long I’d last in seminary,” he said. “I think the longest was two years. Even my family was a ‘wait and see.’ ” At 32, he has now been a priest for five years.

The shortage of help has created an extra burden for Gutierrez as well. He looks to God for strength and to the advice of his parents for encouragement.

“Yeah, there’s a shortage. So what?” he said. “You work hard and do the best you can do.”

The initial adjustment to clustering was difficult, psychologically, for the two churches, particularly Nativity, whose rectory, traditionally home to the parish priest, no longer houses a priest. Dyer and Gutierrez both live in the rectory at Columbkille, forming a small community with Father Paul Ruby, who ministers to elderly and ill priests. Nativity’s rectory serves as a parish house now.

At St. Columbkille, Carrie Mosley remembers when priests had the luxury of time to drop in on church members more often.

“It always seemed to be at a time when I needed a little lifting up,” she said of the spontaneous visits. “Used to be the priest would stop by your house any time. Now they don’t have the time to do that. I think that’s a tragedy. I really do.”