ANTWERP, Belgium (AFP) — A Belgian bishop is taking on the Vatican with a push to ordain married men as priests — telling AFP the reform is key to stemming a plunge in vocations across many traditionally Catholic nations.

Johan Bonny has officiated for 17 years in the port city of Antwerp, and in that time has seen a collapse in priest numbers as the Church confronted a broader crisis fuelled by clerical abuse scandals.

In recent weeks, the 70-year-old issued a public appeal for the Roman Catholic hierarchy to rethink the rules on ordination as a matter of urgency.

“It’s a cry from the heart,” Bonny told AFP in an interview, “a way of saying ‘Help! This can’t go on.'”

A worldwide phenomenon, the decline in Catholic vocations has been sharpest in Europe, faced with an ageing priesthood and fewer young men willing to step up.

In Belgium’s French-speaking south it has been offset by the arrival of a new generation of priests from francophone Africa, but in Dutch-speaking Flanders the numbers have fallen off a cliff.

“There were at least 1,500 priests in the Antwerp diocese 40 or 50 years ago. Now we have fewer than 100 active priests,” Bonny said.

And yet, he argues, “there are married men who meet all the requirements we ask of unmarried candidates.”

“I have several of them in my diocese,” he said.

Bonny made the case for reform in a pastoral letter in mid-March, in which he announced he would “make every effort to ordain married men” in Antwerp by 2028.

“The question is no longer whether the Church can ordain married men as priests, but when it will do so, and who will do it,” he wrote, saying there was “almost total” consensus among Catholic faithful on the matter.

He issued the call in outlining his plans for implementing recent conclusions by the Synod, a years-long consultation on the future of the Church set to culminate with a global assembly in 2028.

It is the first time the Synod — which involves clergy and laypeople — has so openly confronted modern-day social issues from LGBTQ questions to the ordination of women and married men.

While men entering the Latin rite priesthood must be celibate, in the Church’s Eastern rite already-married men may be ordained.

Bonny points to the inconsistency to press for Vatican doctrine to evolve, noting that neither the Latin nor Eastern code is “more or less Catholic”.

In his own diocese, he told AFP, there are already three married priests — two originally from Ukraine and one Belarusian.

“So how do you explain to a young man raised here that what is possible for his friends is not possible for him? It’s very difficult,” he said.

– Making the clergy ‘healthier’ –

Contacted by AFP, the Vatican declined to comment on Bonny’s letter — which caused a stir well beyond Belgium’s borders.

The Belgian conference of bishops said it took note of his call for support and for further debate — promising to “organise this consultation” while declining comment on the core issue.

A prominent figure in Belgium’s Church, it is not the first time Bonny has taken such a public stand.

The bishop previously accused the institution of turning a blind eye to the sexual abuse of children by another Flemish bishop, since defrocked.

He also advocated for the blessing of same-sex couples, well before the recent shift by the late Pope Francis to authorize the practice in limited circumstances.

“God loves all his children — it must be possible to express God’s benevolence towards these couples too,” Bonny told AFP.

On the matter of ordination, he also cites the well-being and mental heath of priests — and the isolation that can come with celibacy.

“Some are quite unhappy,” he said. “No one was made to live alone. We need to make the clergy a healthier place.”

And there is an overarching imperative, he argues, to mend the Church’s public image.

In Flanders, a 2023 documentary featuring victims of clerical sexual assault had a major impact, accelerating the exodus of believers with a record number of people formally leaving the Church.

“We have become a Church poor in numbers, poor in moral credibility,” Bonny said.

“To regain trust, we need everyone. Accepting only celibate men as priests is a luxury we can no longer afford.”