Minnesota college seminary bucks nationwide decline in enrollment

ST. PAUL (AP) - Enrollment at the college seminary at the University of St. Thomas has doubled in the last six years, giving hope to Roman Catholic leaders that a decades-long decline could be turning around.

St. John Vianney College Seminary at St. Thomas expects 155 students this fall. Typical of the group is 19-year-old Tim Lange, Brainerd, who said he'd been planning a "normal" college experience.

"I was not thinking of seminary," Lange told the St. Paul Pioneer Press.

But after a summer volunteering at a Bible camp, where he counseled and shared his faith with younger teens, it hit him. "I thought: 'This is so fulfilling; I could do this for the rest of my life."'

Officials at St. John Vianney said they're seeing more students like Lange - Catholics energized by local youth ministries who seek a deeper bond with their faith and a desire to lead.

Nationally, college seminary enrollment has plummeted from more than 13,000 in the late 1960s to about 1,300 today, according to the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate at Georgetown University. The recent increase at St. John Vianney has gone mostly unnoticed, but officials there think it could be important.

"This is sort of the new trend," said Rev. William Baer, the seminary's president. "It's kind of a response by young Catholics saying, 'Let's get back on track."'

Seminary life is not the typical college experience for young men. They agree to live as if they will become priests, which means practicing celibacy and not dating, among other things.

Lange, who grew up in Brainerd, was initially reluctant. He'd been accepted to Notre Dame and wasn't planning to be a seminarian there, but said he grew increasingly attracted to the "discipline and life centered on Christ." This fall he'll start his second year at St. John Vianney, and said his first year went well.

Seminarians take classes with other St. Thomas students and earn undergraduate degrees with a concentration in philosophy. Baer said many seminarians are like him - men who decided in mid-life to enter the priesthood.

He said the younger men, like Lange, typically come from small towns with strong parishes. Most do not come from Catholic high schools.

Not all seminary students become priests. About 35 percent to 40 percent continue on the path to priesthood, Baer said, while others choose law school or other secular paths.