Parochial Houses.

I am sure there is at lease a house in each parish. But there would have been several per parish.

Our parish has 2 or 3 (definitely 3 a few years ago but think there's only 2 priests now so I don't know) and not small cheap houses either.

Could never understand why they couldn't share as they are 3 bedrooms and 2 bedrooms are big....then a box room which is a box!

In some bigger parishes there is a Parish Priests house and a Curate's house.

The Curate's share their accomodation.

I expect that with the reduction in vocations there will be quite a few houses being either sold or repurposed.

three here…

each priest has his own house. Always been the way..

Two of them will be three bedroom houses. The other is a bungalow I’m guessing is a two bedroom job.

by my guess that’s about 1.5 million in church assets just to accommodate 3 lads….one is semi retired…

each property is a 1 to 3 minute walk from the church door….

there are nearby two bedroom apartments that could be bought for about 270,000 each. Less upkeep costs etc..

I'm far from rural and neither is Strumms..... we're not same locality but I've an idea where he's based.

Like him the houses would be close to 1-1.2 million, which just seems madness.

Parishes in my estate most parochial houses are on church grounds now. Down sizing or getting rid of assets I haven't a clue but my parish what was the former PP's house is now in private hands as for the current PP his house is beside the church next to the garage where the gardening equipment is stored. Jammy get falls out of bed into work and has plenty of storage.

Surely the same should apply to all old people in council housing?

Older priests are at least still working. People are gonna get a shock once the priests die and there's no one to do funerals.

Plenty of spare rooms in them. Peter McVerry should be on it.

Our parish priests house is housing a Ukrainian family and our local priests house was sold to Focus Ireland.

Parishioners pay to build and maintain it. Goes in the name of the Bishop from day one. No need for a full time priest in the area anymore and the Bishop sells it and the locals don’t see a penny of it. Nice long term ‘investment’ for the Church.

Most sold off around here. There's one parochial house for a single priest covering three parishes.

Fair play to your community for getting that done. I know at least three parishes my scenario has happened. Depends on the Bishop I suppose…

Just as most weddings no longer take place in a church, it won't be too long before most funerals won't either and the world will keep turning. Then we'll wonder where the many billions in funds provided by the Irish people over the decades, often more than they could afford, went.

Don't know where you live but over this side of the country most people still get married in a church.

There are cases of rural churches that no longer resident priests. The priest just drives in for mass. Leaving houses empty is not favoured by dioceses. The houses will degrade and the churches could be robbed. I know one cases where one is rented to a woman for say 400 euro or so. That is a fairly commo. n practise. Others would be sold off.

Actually no. Bishops do not own parochial houses. The diocese owns it.

They were happy enough to have collected money from generations of lower class Irish scuzz. It's about time they had to share their living conditions.

Jesus sought out the poor, the oppressed, the shunned, didn't he? The priests should be climbing over each other to emulate Jesus and live among those the rest of us would consider to be undesirable neighbours.

Unless... unless they're pompous old men who have been grifting their living from the uneducated and gullible while keeping as much distance as they possibly can...

Bishops don’t own anything. Priests don’t own anything. The diocese owns any property. The bishop is over the diocese but he wouldn’t be buying and selling properties. It’s not run like a corporation. Did you think that whoever was the bishop “owns” the buildings?!?

Read the comment to which I was replying then pull your horns in.

No idea what you're getting at by mentioning my grandparents. Weird comment to make, in fact.

If you’re Irish going back a few generations then the “scuzzy lower class uneducated gullible undesirable neighbours” ( 99% of the population of Ireland for 100s of years) you refer to in your very telling post include your own grandparents.

If you can’t understand that then I can’t help you.