Parish life director is a lay title assigned to certain administrators within the United States

Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

. They are professional ministers, appointed by bishops, and act as the leadership of a

parish A parish is a territorial entity in many Christian denominations, constituting a division within a diocese. A parish is under the pastoral care and clerical jurisdiction of a priest, often termed a parish priest, who might be assisted by one o ...

, while a priest is assigned to perform the sacraments. They have not taken priestly vows, and may be married with children. A movement began in the 1980s to set more parish life directors as heads of local parishes, in expectation of a shortage of

pastors A pastor (abbreviated as "Pr" or "Ptr" , or "Ps" ) is the leader of a Christian congregation who also gives advice and counsel to people from the community or congregation. In Lutheranism, Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy and An ...

. The trend did not pick up, and the position has seen a decline in numbers, where there were 553 parish life directors in 2005, and 428 in 2012. During this time, the number of parishes without a pastor rose, from 2,843 to 3,554.

References

Catholic Church in the United States Catholic ecclesiastical titles {{RC-stub