Posted on 05/25/2005 10:35:49 PM PDT by sinkspur
THE leader of Scotland's Catholics has risked reigniting a row over married priests by predicting the Vatican will eventually relent and allow the practice.
Cardinal Keith O'Brien, the Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh, said the success of married deacons in the church means the change is likely.
The church leader has upset traditional Catholics in the past with his views on celibacy, homosexuality and the priesthood.
His latest comments were made in an interview with the Catholic Times, which will be published on Sunday,
Asked if he believed married priests will become a reality, he said: "Having seen something of the apostolate of married deacons, I can foresee the day when there will be married priests."
The Cardinal has angered conservative Catholics in the past with his acceptance of gay priests, as long as they remained celibate.
However, since being elevated to the College of Cardinals he has espoused views more in line with Vatican teachings. Cardinal O'Brien's latest comments drew criticism from the right-wing Catholic Truth movement.
A spokesman for the group said: "He is trying to say that he is not necessarily personally in favour of this but we can debate it. It's a sleekit way of trying to have his cake and eat it."
However, a poll of 80 Catholic priests in Scotland conducted only last month suggested 40 per cent believed they should be allowed to marry, but the issue remains thorny to many conservative Catholics.
Cardinal O'Brien gained a reputation as a liberal after he said in 2002, before he became a cardinal, that he saw no end to theological argument against celibacy within the priesthood.
A day later he issued a joint statement with Mario Conti, the archbishop of Glasgow, in which the pair said: "While no-one would suggest clerical celibacy is an unchangeable discipline, we believe it has an enormous value."
The following year he risked angering conservatives again when he broached the subject of married priests.
He said in a thanksgiving mass that the church should have "at every level" a discussion about clerical celibacy.
He said the argument for married priests was supported by the case of married Anglican priests who have converted to Catholicism and been allowed to continue their ministries.
However, at the ecclesiastical senate in Rome in October 2003, he made a statement at the end of the Nicene Creed in which he affirmed support of the church's teachings on celibacy, contraception and homosexuality.
It was claimed at the time, but denied, that the added words were said under pressure from the Vatican.
Since then the Cardinal has been careful not to speak out on any of the issues that caused so much controversy.
A spokesman for the Church said today that the Cardinal's comments were not incompatible with his profession of faith in 2003.
He said: "It is a neutral comment on the issue, it is neither a ringing endorsement of the concept, neither is it an outright denunciation."
That is Your Own Personal Interpretation Of Scripture, and you're entitled to it. Enjoy yourself.
I don't know what this guy's deal is, but I think he's right on the issue. I read a piece earlier today predicting that Pope Benedict will move towards re-uniting Rome, the Eastern Orthodox, and the orthodox part of the Anglican church (which I think is TOTALLY awesome), and if that happens, the Catholic church will have a mixture of married and celibate priests. I think it's inevitable, because there are no doctrinal differences that I can detect to prevent it and because surely that unity of the faithful has to be God's will.
We'll see. I hope I live long enough to see it.
It matters not one iota what Catholics think about this or that Church rule. The Church rules. Catholics are RULED. Non-Catholics, anti-Catholics and the confused dissent, whine, moan, groan, witch and complain. So waht? It is not as though we have ever had ever will have or do have democracy in the pews. Thank God! If we did, the same ignorant wind tunnels who elect Ted the Swimmer to the Senate (or might prefer Godfreed Cardinal Daneels as Pope Zwingli I over B-16 would have a say in Church governance.
Man you got one verse on the subject, ignoring all the other verses pertinent to the subject. And not only that you miss the most important point which is that RCs like me believe in the inerrancy of the bible because of the indefectability of the Church that gave it to us.
Why should a good RC who knows his bible give you the time of day for your "prooftext"?
We can discuss priesthood some other time. The thread is about priestly celibacy. You asked why 1 Timothy 4:3 does not apply to the issue and I explained why.
SS: Catholicism, actual Roman Catholicism: Let him accept it who can. Let others not pretend.
A lot of people write a lot of pieces about what they want.
Sinky himself in April said "Ratzinger will never be Pope," but that's only because he didn't want Ratzinger to become Pope. Wishful thinking is a powerful analgesic.
I'm not going to do your googling for you because you decided to wander into a thread and bounce off walls. If you've never read Mosaic law, don't know who Timothy was or missed the part where Christ ordains trusted apostles for specific vocations, then you're not such a "bible wonk" after all.
The concept of a priesthood (as opposed to any ol' anybody) teaching the faith within His body is very clear throughout the bible.
Unification can happen, and one day will, without a dissolution of the Latin Rite. In fact, if the Latin Rite is abandoned in whole or in part, it won't be a unification then but something else.
A very good perspective--they are really " '60's libs"--stuck in a time-warp. This, too, shall pass.
I agreed w/Sink that R. was unlikely--
What people have been excommunicated for doing is insisting on naming and consecrating bishops without so much as a by-your-leave to the authority of the pope and in direct defiance of his orders. Hopefully, B-16 will carry on in scorching the earth beneth their feet. Their followers were declared in schism because they ARE in schism.
One thing you can count on is that neither a pope (any pope) nor God will intervene to whitewash the ecclesiastical crimes of SSPX or its b3ehave alikes. You give tradition a bad name.
Biblewonk: It is not as though Catholicism were any of your impertinent non-Catholic business or as though you comprehend the Bible WE gave you. Go to your room. Or go to some "Bible study" in which the blind and unauthorized lead the blind and unauthorized in the convenience of the contortions they apply to Scripture. If we need your input on Catholicism, we will be sure to ask.
You can call the RCC the church of Satan for all I care. What matters is Truth, not YOUR version of the truth or MY version of the truth, but Truth. "Truth" without a controlling authority is nothing but "opinion". The controlling authority of Truth is the Holy Spirit. Since the Holy Spirit does not physically manifest itself (other than in the form of tongues of fire, wind, and a dove), it manifests itself spritually, requiring a human vehicle to deliver and confirm said "Truth".
It's utter insanity to presume that the Holy Spirit invoked a system of delivering truth based on what you and I FEEL is right. Billion and billions of Christians later, we have 20,000 Protestant Churches and still only ONE Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church - the guardian of Truth, whether you want to believe it or not. Because, frankly, opinions are like... well, you know.
You have to read it to have one, otherwise you are just quoting the party line.
Please show me the verses that show that a Christian Priest must be celebate(sp).
No, it's because there isn't one. You might as well try and show me the verse about Mary distributing all graces from heaven as she wills, to whom she wills as much as she wills.
Yeah cause who cares what the actual words say. It's all about 2000 years of tradition isn't it.
Well actually, all you have is one catchism(sp) and one billion different interpretations of small subsets thereof. It's the equivalent of one billion different denominations which is why this and so many other RC disagreement threads exist.
Good question. There isn't one, and as you know some married men are allowed to become priests.
Celibacy of priests is a Latin tradition dating from the Middle Ages. It was firmly established by Pope Leo the Great. The underlying theology is that a priest is a vicar of Christ and is spiritually married to the Church, because Christ is married to the Church. If he is at the same time married in the usual sense to a woman, that creates a complication in his life because his loyalty is now divided between the Church and the earthly family. It can be allowed as a charity to a man already married who at the same time is called to priesthood. Fundamentally, a married priest is an exception, which became the rule for parish priests in Orthodoxy and Eastern Rites. Bishops are celibate throughout the Church.
None of that is in the Bible, at least not directly, so don't ask for verses. The Church does not operate in wonkish ways.
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