The apparent shortage of school chaplains can be addressed, but what is required is a willingness to recruit not only lay adults, but to explore the untapped resource of committed and able school students

No reversal is apparent in the continuing shortage of priests for parishes. When you combine this with a limited provision for training lay Catholics to work as members of chaplaincy teams in schools, what do you do when the bishop asks all Catholic schools and colleges in his diocese to ensure that their chaplaincies are meeting the spiritual and pastoral needs of the students?

This is the dilemma I faced when I attended a meeting of headteachers in Salford some time ago. Bishop Terence Brain understood the difficulties; he said lay chaplains could be appointed if the chaplaincies were not being served by a member of the clergy. The problem was that many Salford priests were already taking more than one parish (not to mention schools, hospitals and prisons) – and, even if there were enough suitably qualified lay chaplains available, many school budgets simply could not afford to support the appointment of a full-time lay chaplain.