Posted on 07/08/2005 10:41:30 PM PDT by gamarob1
Fathers, Husbands and Rebels: Acting outside the Catholic Church, many married priests are attracting a following.
BOSTON — The priests came from three states, converging on a suburban park one Sunday to conduct an outdoor Mass. Wearing white vestments with rainbow-hued stoles, they led the worshippers in prayer and song. They stuck closely to traditional Roman Catholic liturgy.
But as they raised their arms in blessing, the five men revealed unmistakable proof of defiance: All wore wedding bands.
These men, who still consider themselves Roman Catholic priests, have wives, children — and unflinching commitments to their 2,000-year-old faith. As married priests, they say, they are not heretical anomalies but, instead, are following a model set by priests and popes in the earliest days of their church. They are part of a growing national network of thousands of deeply religious men who believe marriage does not compromise their ability to serve as spiritual ministers.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
Nice! Romish Papist has a better ring to my ear. Besides, there's just something about the look in a person's eye when they see you're proud to carry the handle of "Papist" with all the bad connotations people try to attach to it. :)
I prefer Papist as people seem to think it an insult. Not to me, I rather like it.
John,
The most ancient canons are the "Apostolic Canons", and they are probably 1st century. But many of the later canons are from the oral Tradition referred to by St. Basil the Great. To be honest with you, I do not know the answer to your question because I am just not a canonist. But there certainly do seem to be some good clues on all this in the New Testament, clues that indicate to me at least that the so-called "lesser clergy " (deacons & priests), were normally married.
You really are asking the wrong guy. Ask Agrarian or kosta50. See what they think.
An azymite is a wafer-eater. It was once said that "All pope worshipping wafer-eaters are heretics", but that did not include the Uniates as the Uniates were never azymites. Those were the days before politically correct speech came along. Nowadays, we try to avoid such speech so as not to cause offense. It has the disadvantage, however, of encouraging people to think all is well when, in fact, all may very well be worse than it ever was.
I think you were meaning to respond to someone else. I don't think that either Graves or I have never maintained that the Catholic church tricks men into ordination, and then surprises them with the revelation that they are now not going to be allowed to marry. :-)
I frankly don't care what discipline the Catholic church chooses to follow -- it is an internal matter for that church. As the examples of SS Peter and Paul demonstrates, married and celibate clergy coexisted from apostolic times. Celibate parish clergy are uncommon in the Orthodox church but I have met a few. The general attitude in the Orthodox church is that "it is not good for man to live alone," and that thus the most spiritually healthy place for those who choose life-long celibacy is in a structured monastic environment.
The documents of Vatican II specifically state that celibacy and the priesthood are not by definition tied together. Those documents correctly cite the example of the early Church and the univeral tradition of the East in support of that assertion.
You mean Paul was wrong in saying that an unmarried man could be more dedicated to spreading God's kingdom?
GO Figure...
Period.
Siobhan
I think you summed up why the Eastern Rites and the Western Rites (and within the Western Rite, Anglican/Lutheran converts) can have divergent policies on celibacy. It's largely about culture and tradition.
Marriage is a Sacrament, so how can that be a sin???!!! Celibacy is just a discipline, a man-made one at that. It's a choice. Now, Orthodoxy does consider celibate life to be of "higher" standaing but not because of the guilt. If we devote ourselves completely to God, and wish to do nothing but serve Him (some people say "please" Him, but we cannot please God no matter what we do, for He is not subject to passions!), then being married and loving other than God is an impediment, which is why we have monasticism, a life that has no wordly distractions and obligations (Mt Athos, for example can be visted by men only for that reason).
Was it not Christ Himself who commanded us "IN THE BIBLE" to be perfect, as our Father in Heaven is perfect?
No He didn't. What He said in the Gospel is "be [future tense] as your Father in Heaven is perfect." The problem is that you are interpreting the Gospel through English translation, and English does not have that future tense (because it is not a liturgical language) that is equivalent to Greek.
The correct translation in English should be such that the future is hinted in this verse -- i.e. "become" rather than "be.." The Orthodox Church correctly teaches that our becoming Christ-like is a process, and not a decision, that we call theosis.
You are absolutely right. This whole "pederasty" thing is really a cover-up on the part of the pro-homosexual media as far as I'm concerned. It seems that a majority of the cases that I have heard about have involved boys at or nearing adolescence. This is not child molestation, it is homosexual rape/initiation.
But I ask you this -- not as an antagonistic thing, but as an honest question: If you restrict entry to a profession only to men who are willing to go their entire lives without having a licit sexual relationship with a woman, aren't you sort of stacking the deck that a disproportionate number of homosexual men (who cannot have a church-approved sexual relationship of their choice, anyway) will see it as a reasonable option for their lives?
p>And if, by contrast, you have a profession that expects, as its norm, that a man is to be in a stable married relationship with a woman *before* entering it (as with the Orthodox priesthood), that you will have fewer homosexuals?
This is not a reason for the Catholic church to give up its celibacy requirement if they want to keep it, but it would very much seem to me that to have a healthy priesthood, you would need to have an active program to identify seminarians with homosexual inclinations, and then at the very least have an active program for identifying those individuals at high risk of not keeping their vows of celibacy. To do otherwise is to, well, have the situation that exists in all too many Catholic seminaries and dioceses here in America.
Here we go again, NYer. First, why don't you tell everyone what percentage of the "Catholic Church" is made up of "other Catholics?" If I tell you that 94% of all "Catholics" are what you call "Latin" Catholics it is obvious that the "Catholic Church" is predominantly Roman Catholic.
So, for the purpose of brevity, referring to the "Catholic Church" as the "Roman Catholic Church" is overwhelmingly correct. Second, the "Catholic Church" is hardly "Latin." There is a real shortage of good Latin speakers in the Vatican even. It used to be Latin, universally, before Vatican II.
Third, the Catholic Church is the Church of Rome, headed by the Bishop of Rome and is therefore Roman, because all those who are in communion with him are in communion with the Roman Church.
Finally, and most importantly, the Orthodox Church is also fully Catholic and Apostolic and has the same Roman roots. If you read Orthodox Fathers and their epistles, you will find that, even after the schism of the Latin Church was an accomplished fact (in the 15th century), they refer to the Orthodox Church as the "Catholic Church" and distinguish the two separated Churchs by other qualifiers as either Orthodox or Latin, or Papal, Eastern or words to that effect.
Catholicity is not incumbent on the Pope. The Roman Catholics may say so, but then that's only their opinion, and their 1.1 billion claimed followers. That's only 60% of all Christians. The rest of Christianity -- the 700 million or so do not agree.
So, as far as the Orthodox are concerned, we refer to the Church seated in the Vatican as the "Latin" or Roman Catholic Church or the Church of the West, to distinguish it from the Orthodox or "Greek" or the Church of the East and it is not any more derogatory for Rome than for Constantinopole to make such distinctions.
As for the "other Catholics": they are in communion with the Roman Catholic Church and are or have been referred to as Eastern-rite Catholic, "Greek-Catholic," the "Unia," or by name, such as "Melkite Catholic" or "Maronite Catholic" just as some Orthodox Churches who rejected Chalcedon are referred to as "Coptic Orthodox" or "Syrian Orthodox" etc. Nothing derogatory in these terms. Their sole purpose is to avoid confusion and or misunderstanding.
That's funny, this is what I find under Mat 19:12 (NAB):
My apologies. I did misunderstand you. Again please forgive for my oversight.
But we must understand that trying to emulate Christ in celibacy -- it is pnly a choise and not an obligation. St.Paul makes it perfectly clear that this is only his [personal] judgment and not a commandment of the Lord, not even for those who are called to serve God.
For it would be presumptious and proud to assert that those who, simnply because they have given up sex, are less sinful then the rest of us and more fit to serve as priests.
Actually, the number is more like 98%+ Latin Rite. :-)
I looked up our local Catholic diocese, and it identifies itself on the website as "Roman Catholic." They apparently aren't offended by the term.
You are right that all of this touchiness about who is called what is quite silly. I'm liking the guys on this thread who call themselves "Romish Papists" -- they sound like guys you could have a nice pitcher of black-and-tan with!
Orthodox throughout the former Ottoman empire have always been known as "Romans," since the "Byzantine" Empire (the term was invented in the 18th century by a Frenchman, as I recall) was always known as the Roman Empire, and its inhabitants as Romans. Read Fr. John Romanides (one Greek who does care about remembering the Roman heritage of the Orthodox Church.) His family was from Cappadocia, and the family name literally means "son of the Roman."
Orthodox in the Patriarchate of Antioch are colloquially known as "Rum Orthodox", and the Melkites, who split off from them in the 18th century, are sometimes colloquially known as "Rum Catholics." Rum = Roman, since the Ottomans associated the Roman (i.e. Byzantine) Empire with Eastern Orthodox Christianity.
As you say, in many of the "official" statements (that I have posted to FR) by the Orthodox Church since the Schism, the Orthodox bishops tend to refer to themselves as the "Catholic Church," and we certainly are thinking about ourselves when we confess "one...Catholic Church" during the Liturgy. And you don't hear us complaining about the Roman Catholics "stealing" our name!
I don't get offended when "Romish Papists" on FR call us Orthodox "schismatics." Of course that's what we are from their perspective. I respect that! :-)
I agree with you that names are useful so we don't get confused about who is what...
And if, by contrast, you have a profession that expects, as its norm, that a man is to be in a stable married relationship with a woman *before* entering it (as with the Orthodox priesthood), that you will have fewer homosexuals?
Certainly! What chace is there that a homosexual will marry a woman just so he can become a priest? But, at the same time, Agrarian, we must keep in mind that pederasty is not limited only to homosexuals and that heterosexuals commit child rapes as well. However, the preponderance of such acts among homosexuals may suggest the preponderance of their disturbed choices and an increased incidence of them where there is an increased proportion of them in a given group.
Darn, and I was trying to be "generous!"
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