A new national study reports that there are now nearly 31,000 paid lay parish ministers and more than 2,000 others who work in parish ministry at least 20 hours a week on a volunteer basis.

The study found that since 1990 there have been major improvements in pay for the paid ministers, as well as "striking" advances in the involvement of dioceses in the training, screening, certification and commissioning of lay parish ministers, in providing them with continuing education, and in setting employment standards and salary ranges for them.

"For the first time in the history of our country, there are more paid professional lay ministers in our parishes than there are priests," said Father Eugene F. Lauer, director of the National Pastoral Life Center (NPLC) in New York, which conducted the study. It was commissioned by the Committee on the Laity of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and funded by the Lilly Endowment.

Results of the study are reported in the 159-page book "Lay Parish Ministers: A Study of Emerging Leadership," by David DeLambo, associate director of pastoral planning for the Cleveland Diocese, who also collaborated with the center in two previous national studies of lay parish ministry.

An executive summary of the NPLC study along with commentaries appears as a special insert in the fall issue of Church, a quarterly publication of the center. (The two previous studies were conducted in 1990 and 1997.)

The 2005 study was based on survey responses received from 928 parishes across the country and, in a second phase, responses from 752 lay parish ministers and 336 pastors. Its findings:

---The average parish has 1.6 paid lay ministers. If unpaid lay ministers who work 20 or more hours a week are added, the number rises to 1.7 per parish.

---74 percent of salaried lay ministers are full-time employees and 26 percent are part-time.

---Average salaries of the paid lay ministers have climbed substantially over the past 15 years and are now comparable to the average wages of the general American work force, if one ignores other factors such as educational background. Nearly half the paid lay ministers in parishes have a master's degree or better.

---The 1990 study found the average salary paid to full-time lay ministers was in the range of $13,000 to $20,000. In 2005 the average full-time salary was $35,261 and the median was $37,500.

---In 2005, 16 percent of the paid lay ministers were women religious, down from 41 percent in 1990. The drop reflects two converging factors: a 42 percent increase of the total number of such lay ministers over the past 15 years and a steadily declining pool of women religious available for active ministry.

---Women still make up 80 percent of paid lay ministers, down slightly from 85 percent in 1990. Between 1990 and 2005, the proportion of laywomen (as distinct from women religious) in such positions rose from 44 percent to 64 percent and the proportion of laymen rose from 15 percent to 20 percent.

---The lay ministry work force is slowly becoming more multicultural. Hispanics, blacks and other minorities made up only 6.4 percent of paid lay ministers in 1997 but that rose to 11.5 percent in 2005.

---More parishes of all sizes have lay ministers now compared with 1990: 90 percent of parishes with more than 2,500 people now employ at least one lay minister; 75 percent of medium size parishes do so; 42 percent of parishes with 1,000 or fewer members do so.

---In 2005 over half of the said the diocese had been involved in their training and certification, and nearly two out of five said they had been screened by the diocese. In the 1990 survey fewer than 10 percent of the lay ministers said the diocese had been involved in training, screening or certifying them.

---Lay ministers who said the diocese had established policies, ministry classification and salary ranges for them rose from 11 percent in 1990 to 62 percent in 2005. Only 8 percent reported being included in diocesan events in 1990, but 86 percent reported such inclusion in 2005. About 9 percent said the diocese offered them continuing education in 1990, but that rose to 75 percent in 2005.

---CNS "Lay Parish Ministers" costs $19.95 plus shipping. "Ministries: A Parish Guide," a 16-page booklet containing the executive study and parish-oriented commentary costs $2.50 plus shipping, with bulk discounts available. Either can be ordered from the National Pastoral Life Center's Web site, www.nplc.org.