Catholics could face the prospect of having to attend 'collective' funerals and weddings in the coming years.

The Association of Catholic Priests wants men who left the priesthood to get married to be readmitted, and for the church to allow married men and women to be ordained to address the falling number of priests and the problems it is creating.

The group, which represents more than 1,000 Catholic priests, is holding its AGM in Athlone tomorrow. The meeting will address the theme of 'The Vocations Crisis: will clustering work?', with organisers saying "it is imperative... realistic and workable proposals around priesthood be discussed with a view to sustaining our parish faith-communities."

The association says group funeral masses could be on the cards in the future, because there won't be enough priests to conduct single services.

As quoted in the Irish Examiner, Father Brendan Hoban - one of the ACP's founders - says "one of the main functions of a priest is to say Mass. But we’re facing a situation where there won’t be priests available in some parishes for funerals, weddings, or baptisms. That means there’s a very real prospect of priests having to marry several couples at the same time.

"We could even be looking at having funeral Masses where there are up to 10 coffins in the church at the same time," he added.

Fr Hoban has warned that the current policy of 'clustering' parishes to cover a shortfall in priests will not work in the long term.

The ACP is calling on the Catholic Church to implement three proposals to help secure the priesthood's future in Ireland - to ordain married men; to invite back into the Church individuals who left the priesthood previously to get married; and to ordain women to the diaconate.

Fr Hoban spoke to the Pat Kenny Show about the shortage of Catholic priests:

He also expanded on the warning about group funerals and weddings, saying "the reality is we're moving in that direction":