Catholic Scandals: A Crisis for Celibacy?

Touchstone Magazine ^ | March/April, 2002 | Leon J. Podles, Ph. D.

[redhead]

Bookmarked and bumped

[St.Chuck]

Outstanding Article. Thanks for posting it.

[Nubbin]

Thanks for the ping.

I don't personally have a problem with married priests as my own parish priest is married----and a most holy and wonderful man he is, but THIS...

Further, and worse, the mere fact of change would encourage those in the Catholic Church who also want women priests and homosexual marriages.

is also my fear if the Church decides on a wide scale to admit married men to the priesthood.

[Salvation]

Very well written. Covers the Catholic point of view and the good of celibacy/the Sacrament of Holy Orders also.

[DaveTesla]

The church is allowing Homosexuals and pagans into the priesthood.
But it's not supposed to.
We would have to be blind not to see the damage that it is doing to the church.
Priest's are supposed to follow Jesus, the examples of the disciples and the advice of Paul.
Tell me that is not dogma.
This means a vow of poverty, which means they can own very little property.
It also means a vow of chastity.
Which means they should not marry.
To be a priest your concerns must be that of God’s and not of this world.
That is why Jesus and his disciples were not married and did not posses wealth.
This is as the disciples and Jesus did and why it is dogma.
The real truth is that the church has to keep the church clean of such individuals and drive them out.
To quote my savior: "Take these things out of here!"
Rather than do what is right, we suggest changing the ways of Christ and his disciples.
What is right is for the church to remove non-repentant sinners from the priesthood.
But in today’s society which cannot seem to tell a lie from the truth, we wish to blame
the problems of the church (homosexuals and pagans) on the church doctrines and
not on the failure of the church to follow doctrine.

And by the way a Priest Has a Family, his congregation.

Jesus Cleanses the Temple
13 The Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 14 In the temple
he found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the money changers
seated at their tables. 15 Making a whip of cords, he drove all of them out of the temple,
both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the money changers and
overturned their tables. 16 He told those who were selling the doves, "Take these things
out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!" 17His disciples remembered
that it was written, "Zeal for your house will consume me."

[DaveTesla]

Please do not be deceived.
A married man can be a pagan and a Homosexual can he not?
This is NOT the answer.
This Is:
"Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!"
His disciples remembered that it was written, "Zeal for your house will consume me."

[joathome]

YOu have a lot to learn. For starters, not all priests take a vow of poverty. I think most diocesan priests take a vow of chastity and obedience, but not one of poverty. They may inherit great wealth and keep it, write books, etc. This situation isn't new.

Priests who live in community takes vows of poverty. I'm not sure all do, however.

You must differentiate between dogma, which is forever, and practice, which may change.

[joathome]

"Further, and worse, the mere fact of change would encourage those in the Catholic Church who also want women priests and homosexual marriages."

The question to ask is, "Where does God draw the line?" If he draws the line here, and we have drawn the line 10 feet behind it, "why"? Even if drawing that line there was valid in the past (no married men), is it valid for today? Don't confuse dogma with practice. God draws the line at women, but he does not appear to draw the line at married men. IF he does, why has the church allowed married Episcopalians to become RC priests today?

God apparently does allow married men, so shouting down those who question the celibacy rule is like shouting God down. The topic should, at least, be open for discussion.

[joathome]

"Dogma: Among the early Fathers the usage was prevalent of designating as dogmas the doctrines and moral precepts taught or promulgated by the Saviour or by the Apostles; and a distinction was sometimes made between Divine, Apostolical, and ecclesiastical dogmas, according as a doctrine was conceived as having been taught by Christ, by the Apostles, or as having been delivered to the faithful by the Church.

And all of those are still dogmas--not practices. The celibate priesthood is not a dogma. Please do some more studying. If God had said "no", it would be a dogma, and there would be no married priests in the church today. Remember, the church never changes in practice of dogma? Well, it already has, as it already has married priests. A real problem if you believe the church never errs when it comes to dogma, don't you think?

[Snuffington]

Celibacy is a special thorn in the flesh of our sex-saturated culture and is therefore perhaps even more important today than it was in previous generations, which held marriage more in honor. Celibacy proclaims that it is possible to live without sexual pleasure, a rebuke to those who make sexual pleasure the center of their lives and justify horrendous actions (such as abortion) by the impossibility of refraining from sex

This is an important point that is missed far too often in the debate about celibacy within the Catholic Church. Actually two important points.

The first is that our modern view of sexuality, which is often described as "natural" is in fact anything but. We live in one of the most sex obsessed cultures the world has ever known. We've taken the healthy, normal, and natural human sexual desires and exagerrated them in frequently bizarre ways. This is hardly a healthy "baseline" from which to derive permanent rules of sexual conduct for a universal Church for the ages.

The second is that celibacy is therefore, not less relevant as many of the worldly contend, but rather more important than ever. It stands as a firm rebuke to the spirit of our overly lustful age. It is a constant reminder that there are more important things than sex, and higher callings than those of the body.

Any notion of opening the Catholic priesthood to married men (which I think is a healthy topic to discuss regardless of one's position on the issue) must be careful not to demean the value of celibacy for the message it sends to a society that increasingly cannot see anything more important than sex.

[joathome]

True, but "sending messages" to a secular culture is not the only mission of the church. Leading and taking care of the faithful is becoming increasingly difficult with so many pervertedpriests, and priests who standly VERY SILENTLY by while the perversion goes on. While the argument that married priests can have affairs, or commit pedophilia is true, a married priesthood (or partially married priesthood) would quickly wipe out the homosexual culture that currently exists in the church.

More and more churches are being run by the laity.....especially WOMEN laity, because of the shortage of priests. One priest cannot adequately care for thousands of Catholics, unless dispensing the sacraments is the only thing you think a good priest needs to do. Is it any wonder that the feminazis have taken control of so many parishes?

[neocon]

I've located the review of Dr. Podles' book I mentioned in #41. It is unfortunately not available online, but if you are interested, let me know and I will either type it up or scan, OCR, and HTMLize it for posting here. It's a few pages long, and only incidentally related to this thread, so I would post it as a new topic, and put a link here for you.

[Romulus]

Any notion of opening the Catholic priesthood to married men (which I think is a healthy topic to discuss regardless of one's position on the issue) must be careful not to demean the value of celibacy for the message it sends to a society that increasingly cannot see anything more important than sex.

I should have placed more emphasis on this, because I too think it's important. Thanks.

[ELS]

I'm interested. Did you check the New Oxford Review Web site?

[Palladin]

Excellent article. It covers all the bases, and takes a moderate approach.

There is no Biblical reason why the church cannot have a married clergy and a celibate clergy. The two can exist side by side, and work well together. Much like a large family with married and celibate members.

Podles gets to the heart of the matter when he states that married or celibate, the clergy MUST BE strongly masculine.

I look forward to he new book by this very sensible man.

[neocon]

Yes. There's nothing from the Feb. 2000 issue (in which this review appears) there at all. The coverage at the NOR website is spotty at best, but it seems they've had a hard disk crash, and much of what they actually had online is in the process of being recovered.

I submitted a proposed web design to Dale Vree, but got no response. And I've also offered - and emailed - HTML-ized scans of the printed journal to the webmaster, but apparently he hasn't used them. Much of the older material is only available in printed form, but the newer stuff is available to the webmaster as "captured keystrokes" in some non-HTML format.

For my own archival purposes, I intend to burn a CD-ROM with all of my back-issues using the structure of the website I designed. I'll then send a copy to Mr. Vree and let him make what he will of it - I think subscribers might want to buy it. But it's a big, tedious project, and nowhere close to being done.

For now, I'll work on getting this review up, if I can manage it before I have to turn my attention to final preparation of music for tonight's Easter Vigil.

[Askel5]

You are going to love the new book ... I'll put up some excerpts on Newtonianism I've already come across!

And, on being in love, there is this:

> "Celibacy is hardest when we fall out of love with Christ. Then it becomes a great burden. I could draw a curve of my own life, and I am sure any priest could draw a comparable one, and my attitude toward celibacy would be seen always in direct relationship to my personal love of Christ. Once our passions cease to burn for Him, then they begin to burn toward creatures...Christ on the Cross and Christ in the Eucharist forever become the touchstone of the question of celibacy. The more we fall away from response to that gift, the less we want to look at a crucifix, the less we want to vist the Lord in His Sacrament."

from Bishop Fulton Sheen's book Treasures in Clay in a chapter entitled "Reflections on Celibacy," sent in to OSV by Father Joseph Follmar.

[neocon]

I've posted the review in question as Is Christianity Just for Women and Sissies?. Enjoy.

[neocon]

Once our passions cease to burn for Him, then they begin to burn toward creatures

Familiarity may not breed contempt, but it does breed complancency. The sacred can become mundane if one doesn't constantly renew one's sense of wonder, and deepen one's understanding. As you say, it's a relationship with God we are called to live out in every moment of our lives.

St. Paul's admonition to "pray constantly" in order to focus on things above, was taken up by John Cassian, who advocated what we would call today the "prayer of the heart". With every inhalation, one prays "God, come to my assistance," and with every exhalation, "Lord, make haste to help me." These are the Psalm verses with which each of the Divine Offices begins. The readings, prayers, hymns, and psalmody spread throughout the day puts in perspective where our heart really belongs: not to the world but to Christ.

So, as a practical way of addressing some of these problems, I would advocate the public recitation of the Office in every parish church, preferably at the appropriate hours of the day, with the laity encouraged to attend and participate. It's not a panacea, of course, but it would at least reprioritize one's life. The public nature would ensure that the priests are fulfilling their obligations as well. I think it's far more important than attending another committee meeting, or doing some of the countless things that tie up a priest's time, many of which could be handled by the laity.

Thank God for Fulton Sheen! We need another like him.

I'll look forward to reading the new book. Thanks.

[joathome]

And what Christian can honestly say he was passionately in love with Christ for his entire life? Even while professing belief, one's passion waxes and wanes to some extent. Even Mother Theresa seems to have had some serious droughts in that regard.