Posted on 03/11/2006 4:34:14 AM PST by Diago
Here are two reforms
With the election of Pope Benedict XVI, Christians around the world will most likely not be able to look forward to needed reforms within the Catholic Church. There are two major areas of reform that are needed to accommodate our progressive world society.
The first change regards the treatment of women. In a religion that preaches equality among all people, the Catholic Church is locked into a stone-age mentality by not allowing women to be ordained as priests. Frankly, it is rather Talibanesque.
The other area of needed reform deals with allowing priests to marry. A lot of people naively think that celibacy is a tradition that has existed forever. In reality, priests once were allowed to marry, and this was changed during the Middle Ages.
I wish Pope Benedict XVI the best, as I am sure that he will be a wise leader, and I hope he will strive for equality. I also hope these simple reforms I suggest will be made in my lifetime.
Pierce Bush, Houston
[Pierce Bush is the president's nephew]
Two excellant points.
and historically accurate. does anyone know why celibacy of priests came about?
Pierce is the teen-age, learning disabled son of Neil Bush?
Here ya go:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03481a.htm
"Pierce is the teen-age, learning disabled son of Neil Bush?"
I'm not sure but the fact that he goes to Georgetown explains a lot:
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/09/02/gop.bushs.lkl.access/
PIERCE BUSH, GEORGE W. BUSH'S NEPHEW: I'm feeling great. It's really exciting to be here at the Republican convention. Just started out at a great school, Georgetown University. Very excited about that.
There is no theology behind the celebacy discipline. The RC church already has lots of married priests. The Eastern Rite allows it and many married, converted Episcopal and Lutheran clergy take Holy Orders and remain married.
Thanks.
Dear Pierce Bush:
Go to hell.
I'm sure you're already headed there, given your own lack of understanding of the True Church. For now, though, stay out of the business of my Church, boy.
Alan
San Antonio
It is kind of interesting that the President's nephew wrote this nearly a year ago and a google search shows that there was absolutely no reaction in the press.
The kid is not even Catholic. Imagine if he had weighed in suggesting that Jews should be able to ham. What kind of reaction would have ensued?
I saw this kid on TV this morning. He has the Bush curse of a tied tongue, but unlike most of the other Bushes, he is of below average intelligence and has no class.
At first I thought it odd that a blue blood Protestant would even bother to weigh in on such a thing.
But then I read that he was attending Georgetown and quickly figured out where he had learned to hate the Church.
"Should liberals leave the Catholic Church?" -- and I reiterate, YES. Please!!
Maybe he meant "Stoned age"?
No, historically inaccurate. Priests have never at any time in any part of the Church been allowed to marry after ordination.
IN THE PAST, men already married were allowed to be ordained provided that they took up celibacy, and often with the requirement that they seperate from their wives, with her entering a convent.
The celibacy of Priests is a tradition of Apostolic Origin reflecting the Christian teaching that it is good to marry, but even more excellent to remain or become henceforth perpetually chaste (1 Corinthians 7.1, 7-8, 34), and the statement of Jesus Christ to His Apostles that those who gave up having a wife for the sake of the kingdom would receive a 100-fold reward in heaven (St. Matthew 19.10-12, 27-29).
At the dawn of the era of the Church coming out of the catacombs around AD 300, the very first Canon Laws prescribed perpetual celibacy for the Priests of the Church, a ruling that was endlessly repeated over the next 150 years by Popes and Councils.
The change in the Middle Ages was not to introduce celibacy as some new requirement, but to forbid the ordination from then on of any men who was still married, regardless of any pledge of celibacy they wished to make.
Sorta makes you feel bad for his elder relatives.
friendly amendment: "provided they took up continence" (sexual abstinence within marriage) rather than "took up celibacy" (a married man cannot be celibate, since celibate = not married, but he can be continent, abstinent).
Poor guy. Too bad he didn't go to a Catholic school.
I would also like to congratulate all of you for not making jokes about his name. It's v-e-r-y tempting isn't it?
The celibacy of priests is a very convoluted and non-simple story. I think the crux (simplified version) is that when men happened to be married, they could become priests. If they were single and became priests, then they didn't marry.
Good link. Thanks for posting it.
there are those who would argue that Jesus was radical in his approach to women in the culture that was Old testament culture. Therefore he was advocating a much more egaltarian role for women. He allowed women to listen to him along with the men, etc.
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