Autism and the Priesthood: How the Church Is Responding
As autism diagnoses rise, seminaries are grappling with how to form and support men on the spectrum who feel called to the priesthood.
Psychologist and Catholic deacon Lawrence Sutton once worked with a seminarian, now a parish priest, who genuflected before the Blessed Sacrament but looked like a toy soldier when he did it.
Not only did the young man stick out because of his unusual movement, but he couldn’t understand why his mechanics drew attention to himself. His autism spectrum disorder (ASD) was preventing him from performing the knee-to-floor movement in the customary manner.
Deacon Sutton, director of pre-theology formation at St. Vincent College and Seminary in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, has more than a quarter-century of experience treating autism, a neurodevelopmental condition that affects how a person interacts with others and experiences the world. Instead of ignoring the man’s habit or recommending that he leave the seminary, the deacon pressed him to copy the more fluid motion that the other seminarians used and that most Catholics learn as small children.
“And just within a few weeks, he was invisible from that perspective,” Deacon Sutton told the Register. “He didn’t understand why he had to do it, but that wasn’t important.”
Deacon Sutton, who specializes in developmental disabilities, has seen this type of challenge frequently in the seminary — autism-related characteristics that might pose difficulties for a future priest.
Church leaders are examining the issue with urgency, as a society-wide rise in autism identification has raised new questions about the preparation and screening of seminary candidates who are on the spectrum.
As of 2022, one in 31 children had been identified with ASD, more than double the number from 2001, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s latest numbers.
According to a July 2026 report from the McGrath Institute for Church Life at the University of Notre Dame, that increase has coincided with a growing number of seminarians who exhibit autism-related characteristics, including “difficulty with social cues, cognitive and emotional rigidity” as well as “impairments in executive functioning” — which refers to the ability to organize and complete tasks.
The McGrath study found that many Catholic seminaries lack the resources to support and assess seminarians who fall on the autism spectrum. It also noted that U.S. bishops appear divided over how to approach such candidates for the priesthood.
Twenty percent of bishops said they would not ordain men described as “high-functioning on the autism spectrum” but who “miss some important social cues,” according to a survey published in June 2025 by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA) at Georgetown University. Another 57% consider the condition “worrisome” but not disqualifying on its own, while 18% said they aren’t sure.
The Register recently interviewed Catholic priests who fall on the autism spectrum as well as psychologists who work with seminaries. Some said that while they understand the concerns of bishops who see seminarians as future pastors running parishes, candidates with autism should be considered on a case-by-case basis.
Diverse Challenges
The challenges associated with autism in the priesthood vary from one man to another because the lifelong condition presents itself differently among individuals on the spectrum.
Father Mark Nolette, 67, a priest of the Diocese of Portland, Maine, told the Register that during about 16 years in parish ministry, he found aspects of parish life challenging. He described, for instance, hearing confessions on a Saturday afternoon followed by celebrating Mass as “draining to the point of being painful.”
While celebrating Mass “is the center of my life as a priest,” Father Nolette told the Register, his “limited social energy” requires certain strategies to get through public Masses. These include not looking directly at anyone while preaching and taking time “both before and after celebrating Masses to gather the necessary energy and then to recover it.”
Father Nolette wasn’t diagnosed until more than 25 years after he was ordained.
For Legionary of Christ Father Matthew Schneider, his own autism became apparent to him only after, as a new priest, a Catholic school told him not to return for a second year as chaplain because he was missing social cues. That rejection caught him by surprise and eventually led to a diagnosis.
“I knew I wasn’t the best socially, but I wasn’t someone who couldn’t do social interactions at all,” Father Schneider, now in his mid-40s, told the Register. “And so I didn’t really necessarily see it as that big of an issue as some others might.”
The varied experiences of priests with autism show how differently the condition can affect individuals, making it difficult to judge a candidate’s suitability based on an autism diagnosis alone.
“When it’s profound, that’s very clear,” said Timothy Lock, a psychologist at St. Joseph Seminary in Dunwoodie, New York, who co-authored the McGrath Institute report. “But most of the cases we’re talking about are in the mild range, and so it’s a very difficult call to make.”
The McGrath Institute has formed a task force to study how the Church should assess and support autistic candidates for the priesthood.
Needed Support
When he was a diocesan priest serving in both the chancery and in parishes, Father Nolette experienced occasional conflicts with diocesan officials “who would read my need for accommodations as ‘laziness’ or ‘an antisocial attitude’ and would then see the solution for me to simply ‘try harder,’” he told the Register via email.
“Would you tell a deaf man that he could hear if he just tried harder?” said the priest, who now lives a contemplative life as a hermit near Rochester, New York, where he has served with a ministry called Autism Consecrated since 2021.
Deacon Sutton estimates he has worked with about 30 seminarians who are autistic, of whom only one had to leave the seminary. The rest have been ordained priests.
“They really are quite good,” said Deacon Sutton, author of Autism and Holy Orders: How to Help Seminarians with Autism Become Effective Priests (2022). “If you ask somebody to do something … they’ll do it and they’ll complete it and they’ll do it well.”
Sutton said the key is developing strategies for social situations that men on the autism spectrum can learn and apply.
“They want to do it right. And they are disappointed when they don’t,” Deacon Sutton said. “It’s just making that time and being patient.”
Specific Assignments
But just as important as the preparation autistic priests receive may be the assignments they are given.
Father Schneider, who doesn’t see himself as a potential parish priest, has instead served in other roles, including as a formator and instructor at Holy Apostles College and Seminary in Cromwell, Connecticut, and as a Catholic commentator on social media platforms such as X (formerly known as Twitter), where he has more than 87,000 followers.
Father Schneider is also president of Autistic Catholics and author of God Loves the Autistic Mind: Prayer Guide for Those on the Spectrum and Those Who Love Us (2022).
Like Father Schneider, Father Charles Robinson, 39, doesn’t think he could serve in a parish effectively due to his autism. But his religious order, the Franciscans of the Immaculate, offers him non-parish opportunities, and he is currently studying for a doctorate in dogmatic theology in Rome.
Father Robinson, who was diagnosed with autism as a young child and received support from an early age, said most people probably wouldn’t suspect his condition.
He also said that while some may complain that his presentation is stilted and his sermons are too long, his autism also comes with certain advantages, including “a bit more sympathy” for what he called “the eccentric fringe.”
Father Robinson acknowledged that bishops short on priests may prefer men who can quickly take over parishes, but urged them to consider other roles. He contrasted the “Green Beret priest” who can be placed in almost any situation and adapt — with a priest who has a narrower social range but can still serve a diocese effectively.
Father Nolette also said that while some autistic men might do well in parishes, others may be suited to teaching, chancery work, or prison and hospital chaplaincies.
Case-By-Case Basis
Father Schneider acknowledged that an autism diagnosis warrants further investigation but argued that it shouldn’t lead to automatic rejection.
“That’s reasonable to say — ‘Hey, let’s look at this. Let’s see if this is an obstacle.’ But to automatically put it as an obstacle, which a small percentage of bishops did, I think that is not fair to a good number of men who could be good priests, who are autistic,” said Father Schneider, referring to the CARA survey.
To put things in perspective, Father Robinson noted that even the vast differences in ability among people with and without autism are “less than the difference between us now and the state of the blessed after the resurrection.”
“You could say in a certain way that we’re all a little autistic down here.”
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- autism
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