Call To Action: Dump Celibacy

Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel ^ | 11/8/03 | Tom Heinen

[ninenot]

Optional celibacy backed at Catholic conference

By TOM HEINEN
theinen@journalsentinel.com

Last Updated: Nov. 7, 2003

About 2,800 reform-minded Catholics from around the nation gave a standing ovation Friday to a few of the 169 Milwaukee-area priests who took the rare step of supporting optional celibacy in letters this year to the president of the U.S. bishops conference.Celibacy's History

A short history of celibacy in the Roman Catholic Church:

300: The Council of Elvira, a local synod in Spain, mandates celibacy for clergy under its jurisdiction.
366: A growing body of papal teachings favors celibacy, but the observance of celibacy is not uniform.
1073-1085: Pope Gregory VII declares that celibacy be universally observed as part of an overall reform of the church.
1522: Martin Luther condemns celibacy.
1545-1563: The Council of Trent upholds universal celibacy in direct response to Martin Luther's statements.
1967: Pope Paul VI reiterates the tradition.
1971: The World Synod of Bishops reaffirms celibacy.
1978-2003: Pope John Paul II consistently reaffirms his belief in celibacy. However, in 1980, he authorizes an exception for married Episcopal priests who want to join the Roman Catholic Church.

Source: Father Andrew Nelson, retired rector of St. Francis Seminary.

The reaction came at the annual Call to Action conference, where reformers launched a national letter-writing and education campaign to sustain and intensify the ripples of outspokenness that have spread from here to a number of dioceses across the country.

Dan Daley, co-director of the Chicago-based group, kicked off the 18-month campaign by calling attention to the Milwaukee priests in the Midwest Airlines Center on the opening night of the three-day conference.

At least three of the priests who signed the letter were seated at the front of the ballroom - Father Richard Aiken, pastor of St. Alphonsus Church in Greendale; Father Carl Diederichs, associate pastor of the Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist; and Father Kenneth Mich, pastor of Good Shepherd Church in Menomonee Falls.

Last weekend, a sample letter in support of optional celibacy was inserted into the bulletins at Aiken's church, one of the archdiocese's largest congregations. It included instructions for mailing the letter or any other comments about the issue to Bishop Wilton Gregory, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

"I think that we just have to open ordained ministry up to everyone, both men and women, married and single," Aiken said in an interview at the convention center. "I think it's time we start looking at it now, probably a little late."

Both Milwaukee Archbishop Timothy M. Dolan and Gregory have spoken out on the issue in response to the Milwaukee priests' letter, saying, among other things, that the celibacy issue had already been discussed at length by bishops in past years and would not be reopened.

But that has not deterred reformers, some of whom hope the Vatican's opposition to optional celibacy might change under the successor to the aging Pope John Paul II.

The new Corpus Christi Campaign for Optional Celibacy is being launched by Call to Action and a Cleveland-based reform group, FutureChurch.

Letters to Gregory in support of optional celibacy were handed out and collected Friday night. Education packets also were handed out that included, among other things, information about how to start discussion groups and spark parish-based campaigns.

There also were petitions for people to sign and send to the U.S. delegates who will participate in an International Synod on the Eucharist that the Vatican is expected to hold in late 2004 or early 2005.

At the heart of the effort are demographic data from the Official Catholic Directory that have been posted on a Web site - www.futurechurch.org - for Catholics to see how the number of priests in their dioceses is dwindling as more of the aging corps of priests reaches retirement age or die.

The campaign is building on the work of three Milwaukee-area women who earlier this year started a grass-roots campaign with a post office box and the name People in Support of Optional Celibacy - Terry Ryan of New Berlin; Roberta Manley of Greenfield; and Nancy Pritchard of Milwaukee.

Ryan wrote a rough draft of a petition and letter supporting the Milwaukee priests and shared it with David Gawlik, editor of Corpus Reports, a newsletter for married priests. Gawlik surprised Ryan by posting the letter on the Corpus Web site without further consultation with her, and the effort was quickly endorsed by Call to Action Wisconsin as the electronics documents began circulating around the country and abroad.

As of Friday, 4,485 petition letters had been returned to the post office box. Sister Christine Schenk, executive director of FutureChurch, planned to combine them with the petitions that were signed at the convention Friday and submit more than 6,000 petitions to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops when it meets next week in Washington, D.C.

The celibacy issue is not new for groups such as Call to Action, which called for optional celibacy when it was founded in the 1970s. But the National Federation of Priest Councils - and groups of priests in Chicago, New York, Pittsburgh, Buffalo, and some other dioceses - are joining in open appeals for the hierarchy to consider optional celibacy as one solution for the worsening priest shortage and its impact on the availability of the Eucharist.

[ninenot]

Actually there is just One Interpreter: the Holy Spirit, who speaks through the Church's infallible teaching authority in matters of Faith and morals. You are correct.

It is clear that you do not accept that authority as constituted through conferral of same to Peter and his successors.

'S alright with me.

[ninenot]

"Call to Action: Dump the counsel of the Holy Spirit!"

We've progressed beyond all that silly Holy Spirit stuff. We now have the spirit of the Council!!!

[ninenot]

the world truly would be a grotesque place

A Libertarian-Capitalism paradise, though.

[ninenot]

I suggest you see a doctor and have your myopia corrected. You have, without a doubt, the most significant case of homosexual fixation/hatred I have seen on FR.

[DallasMike]

Yes, Peter had a wife. We don't know with certainty that she was alive when JC called Peter. We ALSO don't know whether (if she was alive) Peter and his wife vowed continence...but Tradition would suggest that that was the case, if she were alive.

Yes, she was alive when Peter was called by Christ and she traveled with Peter.

1Co 9:5 Have we no right to lead about a wife that is a believer, even as the rest of the apostles, and the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas?

According to Clement of Alexandria in Stromata III (I haven't found an English translation, but here's what the Catholic Encyclopedia says), Peter's wife was the first of the two to suffer martyrdom. Eusebius' Historia Ecclesiastica III has this to say:

"They say, accordingly, that when the blessed Peter saw his own wife led out to die, he rejoiced because of her summons and her return home, and called to her very encouragingly and comfortingly, addressing her by name, and saying, `Oh thou, remember the Lord.' Such was the marriage of the blessed, and their perfect disposition toward those dearest to them."

Eusebius goes on to tell us that the apostle Philip had three (possibly four) daughters, and in III,20,1-5 tells us that the grandsons of Judas Thaddeus were sent to Rome for martyrdom, but sent back when the judges saw their calloused hands.

Invoman cited you the rules set down by Paul for continence in post 184. There's no reason to suggest that the rules somehow don't apply to clergy.

Can you give me a citation to this "tradition" that says Peter's wife had died or, if she hadn't, that they had taken a vow of continence?

To sum it all up, the "tradition" you claim exists (actually two traditions that contradict one another!) not only contradict scripture, but also contradict the writings of the Early Fathers. Who is telling you these "traditions?" Whoever it is is not telling you the truth and you should be questioning either (1) their lack of familiarity with scripture and the writings of the Early Fathers; or (2) their motives for telling you these things that aren't true.

 

 

[DallasMike]

One can force a reading any way they want, but imposition of a discipline versus voluntary acceptance of same are two VERY different things to people not residing in Dallas and attacking the Church.

Why are so filled with hatred toward me, ninenot? All I've done is point out the truth. It's not me who is forcing a reading into scriptures, it's your side who is pretending that the scriptures don't mean what they say.

The apostle Paul specifically permits clergy to marry and it is obvious from both scriptures and the writings of the Early Fathers that they did.

If you really care about the Catholic church, you ought to be concerned when they don't follow what scriptures and the Early Fathers say.

[DallasMike]

This thread has gone over 200 posts, amazingly, without flames and personal attacks.

What am I, chopped liver? Ninenot at the beginning began to attack me and even called me, if I remember correctly, the "poison in the well."

[DallasMike]

There was exactly ONE documented case of a priest selling indulgences.

Oh, please -- the practice went on for over 400 years!

Some of us here are trying to have a serious intellectual discussion. Please don't post things that are obviously nonsense.

[DallasMike]

Please demonstrate where in this passage Peter's wife is ALIVE.

There's nothing that says that in this particular passage. However, we know from the following passage that his wife traveled with him at the time that the book of Colossians was written, unless you won't to argue that he was really carrying around his dead wife's body.

1Co 9:5 Have we no right to lead about a wife that is a believer, even as the rest of the apostles, and the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas?

Finally, we have the writings of Clement of Alexandria and Eusebius that refer to Peter's wife being the first of the two to suffer martyrdom.

I know why you have such a hatred of me, ninenot. It's because I do my research.

 

[gcruse]

Libertarian-Capitalism

Now, that's something to be fervently desired. :)

[BlackElk]

I want as many thoroughgoing schisms as are necessary to thoroughly purge the Roman Catholic Church in this nation (leftist AmChurch) of each and every adherent to schismatic and heretical ideas and practices. In the United States, that will be a big job but one that is very worth doing.

How the Vatican governs the Catholic Church is the business of Catholics and no one else, Mike. That is the way it is worldwide because Jesus Christ Himself founded this Church. It is particularly true in the United States which has a First Amendment guaranteeing the same and state constitutional provisions doing likewise.

I almost never make the following argument but, for you, I will make an exception. If you think that clerical predator/perverts performing heterosexual or homosexual acts upon others or being performed upon is a phenomenon limited to the apparent 4% of the Catholic priests involved in such behavior, your naivete is showing. If you think that the perversion that is clerical child molestation, homosexual or heterosexual, is limited to the infinitesimal percentage of Catholic clergy so involved, likewise. Just this week, the youth pastor of a reformed church in nearby Rockford was arrested for child molesting. He was quietly removed from his clerical duties six months ago. He is still married to the pastor's daughter. I am not saying this at all triumphantly. As you have pointed out, my Church has plenty of its own problems with wayward clerics. Men are sinners. It is not a surprise to learn this over and over after several millenia. It is no excuse either and it is not a basis for irrational discrediting of the faith involved which I have not named.

The Assemblies of God had clerical trials of Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggert and defrocked both (or whatever the proper term may be). Their individual sins were not the sins of their denomination. They were both married and involved in extramarital heterosexual activity. There are published accounts of rabbis hiring killers to do away with the wives of the rabbis and there are other stories of homosexual abuse of children by married rabbis. Judaism was not the cause in either event. Nor is conspiracy to murder a wife by rabbi attributable to Judaism or to the mere fact that the rabbi was married.

None absolutely none, of the above-listed sins of clergy who are not Catholic justifies a single instance of misbehavior by any member of the Catholic Church much less its clergy. Yet, such sins will occur. We are not anticipating heaven on earth. Like our forbears, we will have to wait, if we are fortunate, until death severs our bonds with this earth before we may see heaven.

As to what you, in your imagined wisdom, may regard as biblical or non-biblical, man-made or God-made, that is simply what we Catholics reference as YOPIOS (Your Own Personal Interpretation of Scripture). Your interpretation of Scripture is your business and not at all a matter of concern to me or to most Catholics who have been adequately catechized. If your ideas as to the meaning of Scripture were Catholic, you would BE Catholic, Mike. You are not. To a Catholic, your opinions of Scripture are irrelevant unless you are invited to the conversation. Worship where you please and how you please and mind your own business.

In the Christian world, Roman Catholicism is still the big dog. We are 28% of Americans (fewer if we apply strict standards). There are more than a billion of us in the world and we dwarf numerically any other Christian denomination. If and when, anyone hamstrings Catholicism in the United States, your denomination, if any, and whatever denomination it may be may be will be jeopardized. We serve as your offensive linemen whether you recognize that fact or not. If outsiders breach Catholic defenses in the social civil wars, reformed quarterbacks will be sacked as well as Cathlic quarterbacks. Jesus Christ will no be sacked and neither will the RCC which he has guaranteed. Casualties, however, have been and will be sustained in the fight with those who despise us both.

You will note that I am NOT calling you a "Catholic basher." I see no purpose or dignity in whining nor any reason why I should care, Mike. When we need you to give us the benefit of your wisdom and YOPIOS as to whether our policies are right or wrong, biblical or unbiblical, man-made or otherwise, Mike, rest assured that you will be the first to hear our request. Until then, MYOB.

You can answer this one, Mike. Does the tail end of your first paragraph mean that you think that Christ was suggesting that clergy marry lest they become pedophiles because the burden of being wifeless is too great for a man to avoid sexual abuse of children? What sorts of men do you know, Mike? If any of them are single at, say 40 years old, do you think they are sneaking into the lives of kids in nefarious ways?

For that matter, do you REALLY think that priests are generally unable to find willing and even eager women of inspiring charms? In our world as we know it? Surely you are not that naive.

The problem is that some bishops who are the leftist AmChurch substitutes for actual Catholics are so busy ordaining perverted termites to advance various other liberal agendas not of Rome's making have created our problem. Liberalism, in the RCC, as in society as a whole, is the itch that can never be adequately scratched.

Selling indulgences, Mike? That was always the sin of simony. The sins of individual churchmen are NOT the sins of the Church, not in my Church not in yours. If you think that the "selling" of indulgences (they cannot be "sold" in any event, Mike, but that is too long a story for this thread), is what caused Fr. Luther to go his merry and self-appointed way, then you need to read Table Talk by his pal Melancthon, or the entire pack of "theses" that he nailed to a cathedral door no longer his own.

That's nice that you say good things about the RCC, Mike. We don't need to be patronized. I was brought up in a pre-AmChurch generation of Catholics who took as an affirmation of our Faith the fact that it was despised by the World but standing upon the rock upon which Christ founded it and continuing to do so until the very end of time.

It does NOT take a village to raise a chld. Mike. We are conservatives here and not collectivists. Our whole society is NOT harmed by a priest molesting a child, Mike, however disgusting, deviant, and degraded such an act may be. The child is terribly harmed. Those immediately around that child are harmed. You are not harmed by what happens among folks, not of your acquaintance and who never will be, eight or ten states away.

Vicarious experience is something less than actual experience. Each of us would do well to pay as much attention to our own households, our own congregations, our own neighborhoods, our own states as we do to the latest attention-grabbing headline from half a world away about which no one of us can do much in any event.

If I had the power to sign you to $15 million contract to play third base for the Yankees next year but only on condition that you not also play football and not also play third base for the Red Sox, I would be depriving you of nothing. You would be making a choice between perceived goods. There is nothing wrong with marriage. There is nothing wrong with the priesthood as a vocation.

The Vatican makes the rules for Catholic priests even more so than George Steinbrenner makes them for Yankee baseball players. There is no general contract imposed by union negotiations, no league or commissioner's office to respond to. Above the pope, there is only one authority: God Himself.

For Catholics, the Vatican makes the rules and sets the exceptions. Christ gave the powers of the keys to the popes. The Vatican says that choosing the Roman rite priesthood generally means staying single and not indulging otherwise with adult and consenting women much less with little boys or girls or with other men.

I trust I have not been too frank.

[BlackElk]

One could argue that the moon is made of greencheese but one would be wrong if one said that. The pope is Christ's Vicar on Earth, sinful or not. Get over it! Always sinful, never fallible under the conditions stated by Vatican I in the mid-nineteenth century.

[BlackElk]

Et cum #78 and 79 tui.

[DallasMike]

If you think that clerical predator/perverts performing heterosexual or homosexual acts upon others or being performed upon is a phenomenon limited to the apparent 4% of the Catholic priests involved in such behavior, your naivete is showing. If you think that the perversion that is clerical child molestation, homosexual or heterosexual, is limited to the infinitesimal percentage of Catholic clergy so involved, likewise.

Did I ever say that? No, I didn't. Those things are wrong in any church. Please quit putting words in my mouth.

First you say that approximately 4% of priests are involved in this kind of behavior, then you go on to say that it's an "infinitesimal percentage." I don't know where you learned math, but 4% is not infinitesimal.

As you later said, Catholics represent 28% of Americans and are the "big dog." These crimes affect all of us whether you admit it or not.

Just this week, the youth pastor of a reformed church in nearby Rockford was arrested for child molesting. He was quietly removed from his clerical duties six months ago.

The operative phrase here is that he was removed from his clerical duties, not sheltered by the church leaders above him. One of the worst crimes in all of this mess is that most of the priests who have commited these crimes is that they have been protected by the bishops and cardinals.

The Assemblies of God had clerical trials of Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggert and defrocked both (or whatever the proper term may be). Their individual sins were not the sins of their denomination. They were both married and involved in extramarital heterosexual activity.

Again, they were defrocked, not protected by their denomination. Is it becoming clear that you've missed out on a big point in your diatribe.

To a Catholic, your opinions of Scripture are irrelevant unless you are invited to the conversation. Worship where you please and how you please and mind your own business. ... When we need you to give us the benefit of your wisdom and YOPIOS as to whether our policies are right or wrong, biblical or unbiblical, man-made or otherwise, Mike, rest assured that you will be the first to hear our request. Until then, MYOB.

Er, I don't know whether you noticed, but ninenot started this thread and in post 169, said "let's argue." Who is ninenot expecting to argue with? That's right, people who disagree. FreeRepublic is an open forum.

For that matter, do you REALLY think that priests are generally unable to find willing and even eager women of inspiring charms? In our world as we know it?

Please point me to where I said anything of the sort. If you can't, then please quit putting words in my mouth. I don't lie about you, so please don't lie about me.

Our whole society is NOT harmed by a priest molesting a child, Mike, however disgusting, deviant, and degraded such an act may be. The child is terribly harmed. Those immediately around that child are harmed. You are not harmed by what happens among folks, not of your acquaintance and who never will be, eight or ten states away.

I think that you're quite mistaken. And even if no one but the child and their immediate family were harmed, don't you still want to stop the abuse? After all, abortion only hurts the mother and the baby so, by your reasoning, we shouldn't be concerned about the effects of abortion on society. I know that Catholics don't believe that way on abortion, so why do you believe this with pedophile priests?

Above the pope, there is only one authority: God Himself.

Yes, and He said that clergy may marry. Please read your scriptures.

I trust I have not been too frank.

No, you've just shown that you'll go to any lengths to protect a terribly harmful man-made doctrine no matter what the scriptures and the Early Fathers said.

I noticed that you refuse to address the facts that I've given you but instead engage in a game of name-calling and putting words in my mouth. Are you able to have a seriously intellectual discussion?

 

[BlackElk]

Peter's mother-in-law, fever or not, got up from her sickbed to serve Peter and Christ and their companions.

Pop quiz: Peter's mother-in-law did this because:

a) Peter's wife was away on business, marketing the latest catch to fine Roman restaurants;

b) Peter's wife was a lazy bum who didn't like Jesus or wanted to make a fool out of Peter and thought so little of her fever-ridden mom that she let her take care of the guests; or

c) Peter was a widower.

EXTRA CREDIT: Name, with Scriptural citation, the wife of any other apostle. Five points for each. Take as much time as you like.

[BlackElk]

Mike, #236 is for you too.

[ninenot]

Somewhere, somebody (above) quoted a passage which indicates that Cephas' wife accompanied him on journeys. Even if there was only ONE Cephas, and that Cephas happened to be Peter, it's still a bit of a stretch to posit, affirmatively, that Peter enjoyed usus maritalis with said wife, insofar as we have evidence that continence was the practice. Oh, well.

[BlackElk]

1. Reading is your friend. 4% are involved in sexual misbehavior. A small subset of that 4% is the infinitesimal number involved in clerical child abuse.

2. The RCC is the big dog and it runs its own show and always will.

3. The RCC has defrocked many sexual abusers and failed to defrock others, not unlike other denominations. Not a justification, just a fact. Narrow-minded public authorities would frown on traditional Catholic remedies like burning the SOBs at the stake after a suitable, ummm, inquiry. Just goes to show what happens when the non-RCC buttinskis stick their noses in where they don't belong.

4. As to the Rockford situation, our Catholic bishop Thomas Doran (the genuine article) has instantaneousely removed from active ministry each of three priests accused of sexual misbehavior upon accusation. One of the three is accused of sexual activity with a Catholic high school girl fifteen years of age in a school where he was assistant principal. The other two instances occurred long before this bishop took office but each priest was removed upon accusation. On the other hand, the youth minister of the reformed church is the son-in-law of the pastor. There are many conflicts of interest in that situation which do not arise in a church with celibacy as a rule.

5. Many Catholic priests have been defrocked for misbehavior. If marriage is some sort of protection, query why Swaggert and Baker got into their jams? Your fish have no bicycle.

6. When you suggest that being unmarried leads to child molestation, that is when you put the words in your own mouth.

7. You will likely achieve a lot more by discouraging the abortion mill in your neighborhood or community than you will in hand-wringing over the one that is ten states away. Likewise are your and my practical abilities limited in dealing with child abuse. If everyone lit just one little candle...... in his own neighborhood.

8. Don't put words in my mouth. I gave at the office as a volunteer attorney for more than one thousand abortion mill Rescuers and at least half were not Catholic. Normally, I did this in my own state (Connecticut at that time) although I also went to Wichita, KS on one occasion and to New York on another. I stop what abuse is in my reach. It is the business of the likes of Slick Willie (the Arkansas Antichrist) and the Hildebeast to be concerned 24/7/365 abbout everyone and everything and to pat themselves on the back for their "concern".

9. Read your own Bible, particularly the part in Matthew in which Christ gives Peter the keys of the kingdom and the part of John 6 in which He says to His disciples the hard saying that they must eat His Flesh and drink His Blood to see God. John tells us that many walked away. They still do. The earlier ones knew Christ personally and rejected Him to His face. They had less excuse than those who never knew Him but imagined Him wrongly by applying their own preferences to their interpretation of Scripture.

10. We aren't going to win the cultural wars without you. You aren't going to win them without us. Christ can win them all by Himself. These "conversations" are not productive. I do not welcome or need evangelization by those who think that the Union Band Church of Jesus Christ Fire Baptized or whatever or the Lutherans or the Anglicans for that matter know better than the Church that Jesus Christ Himself founded and guaranteed. 11. What on earth is a basis for "intelligent discussion" that suggests that Catholics should welcome evangelization by the reformed or by anyone not Catholic? What I refuse to do is to get down into some selective Scripture-swapping contest with those who obsess on Scripture alone, faith alone, grace alone or all three alone or whatever.

12. As to the "man-made" doctrine stuff, celibacy is not a doctrine. The pope has the keys. It is a discipline. It exists alongside the disciplines of other Catholic rites: Coptic, Ukrainian, Greek, etc., which ALLOW but do not require pre-ordination marriage. It exists along with exceptions in the Roman rite itself for certain convert clergy. Otherwise see previous post as to irrelevancy.

[BlackElk]

Indeed. Want to start a pool on how long it takes any of them to answer #236 as asked?