[Rytwyng]

Exactly, Our Lord's standard.... "For there are eunuchs, who were born so from their mother's womb: and there are eunuchs, who were made so by men: and there are eunuchs, who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven. He that can take, let him take it." Matthew 19.12

Indeed that is our Lord's standard for who should stay single. But it says nothing whatsoever about our Lord's standard for becoming priests. At least some of the Apostles to whom he made this comment, were married men, yet the Lord himself ordained them.

The later-ordained celibate Apostle Paul, who taught that singless opened unique opportunities to serve, nevertheless instructed believers who couldn't handle celibacy to marry, and also instructed that bishops should be "men of one wife". Even if one interprets this latter passage as prohibiting polygamists, the divorced, etc, rather than forbidding the single, nevertheless certainly he permitted married bishops -- and stricly forbade marital abstinence except as part of temporary periods of fasting and prayer.

[murphE]

The authority that Our Lord established on earth, "which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth." , the Church founded on the Rock that is Peter, interprets it to mean just that, so I accept it.

On what authority do you base your interpretation?