Too few ordained priests

The number of new ordained Catholic priests in the Czech Republic is failing to make up for the number of priests passing away, Czech Cardinal Miloslav Vlk said on Saturday. There are currently 1,800 priests in the Czech Republic but some ten percent are from Poland. Many priests are responsible for more than one parish. In the Prague and Central Bohemia regions, for example, priests reside in only 140 of the 250 vicarages. At a ceremony on Saturday, Cardinal Vlk ordained three new men at Prague's St. Vitus' Cathedral.