The Catholic Church is to target older men as candidates for the priesthood following a dramatic decline in the number of trainee clerics coming forward.
Archbishop Keith O’Brien, Scotland’s most senior Catholic, has called on Scotland’s 900 priests to persuade adult males in their parishes to forsake earthly pleasures and become men of the cloth.
O’Brien said the Church had previously concentrated its efforts on encouraging young people to enter seminaries after secondary school.
The Archbishop of Edinburgh and St Andrews said the Church should be aware that older men could make good recruits. Strict rules on celibacy rule out married men, but would allow widowers, who may have children, to become priests.
Anyone found to have fathered children out of wedlock would also be barred entry.
In a pastoral letter to be read out in all Catholic churches today, O’Brien, the president of the Church’s National Vocations Commission, says: "We all ‘target’ various individuals [to encourage vocations] and invariably concentrate on those of school age.
"Always remember, however, that potential candidates are also in older age groups - those at colleges and universities, those apparently settled in their careers.
"One group of potential candidates who might be overlooked are men who are widowers. Often such men would be interested in considering the priesthood."
This year the Church expects only three would-be priests to enter its two seminaries in October, a record low, which compares badly with the 15 who enrolled just seven years ago.
The seminaries currently have 33 trainee priests undergoing the six year course to become clerics. The Church had 108 seminarians in 1990 and 159 trainee priests in 1983.