MrsDarwin considers the practical effect of opening the door to more widespread ordination of married men in the Roman rite, by looking at the "market" for Protestant clergy.
In sum, Protestants do not have a clergy shortage. However, they do have a lot of churches without ministers...
Liberal denominations have both a high vacancy rate (significantly higher, actually, than for Catholic parishes) and a lot of unemployed clergy.
The problem seems to be that while there are a lot of ordained clergy, many of the openings are only marginably able to support a minister. The P[resbyterian] C[hurch] USA reports that 50% of their vacant churches have congregations of less than 100 adults, many of whom offer salaries in the 20k range for ministers. Many of these are also in rural areas, making it difficult for a minister supported by his or her spouse's job to fill the vacancy. Denominational polls of ordained Protestant clergy revealed very few were willing to go to rural areas, or in some cases to move at all, since in many cases they relied on a second job or a spouse's career to support their families.
Some good thoughts there. Read the whole thing. And it's worth repeating a question in the comments from the great post that sent her off on this tangent: where are all these married men so anxious to serve the church in ordained ministry?
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