Posted on 08/13/2006 7:31:18 AM PDT by Gamecock
These are not priests. They remain Catholic but do not practise according to their following Web site:
"With a growing number of Catholics no longer attending church, more than 70 percent by a recent survey, and the growing shortage of un-married parish priests, we married Roman Catholic priests are offering spiritual and sacramental ministry to people who ask for our help. We respond positively and non-judgmentally to Roman Catholics who have not attended a parish for some time or feel uncomfortable approaching their local parish priest at a time of need."
I'm not sure of your point. It seems that one could leave the cleric but still remain a priest. I do know there are a bunch of women who would claim themselves to be priest, and these claim are illegitimate. However, I can't seem to find any holes in the argument that priests who have left the cleric are no longer priests; albeit I'm not verse in Canon law.
Let me give some facts.
Before I fully retired I spent several years teaching federally incarcerated inmates at Lewisburg Penitentiary and the Allenwood Complex. These locations consisted of 6 facilities.
The one Catholic Church within the geographic had two priests. These two priests had to handle the 6 facilities and also two hospitals in the area.
The allotted time for a priest or other clergy and social service organisations was about 1 hour per day or night. 20 minutes of that one hour was spent on entering and leaving the facility, This left 40 minutes.
A priest would take at least 1 hour to have a Mass including preparation. To hear confessions would be another 1 hour, etc. etc. I could go on with the time frame but I hope you see what I am saying.
Right now we have a local county prison and it is the same. Hospitals and 2 churches with 2 priests. Again, there are limited visit times as it is with all enforcement localities/facilities.
To make an accusation without substantial support is short sighted. Give me your diocese and I will get a priest for you.
There has been several posting on the religious threads regarding the recent "ordination" in Pittsburgh. Women can claim anything but according to the Magisterium, these women are ex-communicated and cannot practise or participate in Roman Catholic Liturgy/
"To make an accusation without substantial support is short sighted. Give me your diocese and I will get a priest for you."
According to state contract we pay them 200 an hour. They are not limited to a specific time frame. If they sign in at 10a and leave at 12p they are paid 400 per contract.
I'm telling the truth, because I was the one who was monitoring the contract and paying the invoices was told specifically this was the case by both our facility chaplain and the Catholic diocese monetary Catholic priests myself.
I resent the fact that you are accusing me of making such an allegation and lying about something like this.
"Marjade is just a bitter, angry woman who has an axe to grind with the Catholic Church."
That is a lie.
BTW, that is also a personal attack. Something you've been admonished before on other threads against me on FR.
You deny being bitter, angry, female and carrying an axe to grind with the Catholic church?
Bitter? Maybe.
Angry? Without a doubt.
Female? An assumption, to be sure - but it's a fair guess.
Axe? You show up on nearly every Catholic thread and make the same obnoxious comments.
I've saved you the trouble and reported my own comments as abuse.
"I've saved you the trouble and reported my own comments as abuse."
It may surprise you to know because of what you think of me as "bitter" or having "an axe to grind", but I didn't report you the last time.
BTW, as you know, as a Protestant I sympathize with the desire for married priests BUT there's something about this movement that isn't quite right. That bit about "second marriages", perhaps...
Celibacy is a matter of self-restraint. That does indeed put one in a superior position than those who cannot practice it. Marriage is no gaurantee of maturity.
I think when people don't have kids they don't make a certain maturation leap, because they've never had the charge of feeding, nuturing, and loving a precious child, all the while putting their own needs and desires last.
People in America get divorced and leave their kids behind to deal with the mess all the time. Your view of marriage seems to be a bit rosy, considering the culture...
Celibacy, as a requirement has a tendency to produce depravity. It dates way back. Both Jerome and Augustine have some quotes out there that suggest they didn't have a clue about human sexuality.
St. Augustine is widely known for his extramarital exploits. He had a good working knowledge about human sexuality and said that his maturity really began when he left his concubine. His views may not be quite 21st century enough for you, but then St. Paul's probably aren't either.
"That does indeed put one in a superior position than those who cannot practice it."
That comes across as being rather arrogant and self righteous attitude to me.
I understand about the nuns. What I don't understand is the claim of what these priests are stating is correct. Is it true, once a priest, always a priest? What does the Canon law state?
The "helpful" heretics at Rent-a-Priest need to study their history. Although married men were ordained as priests and bishops during classical times and the early Middle Ages, these men were not allowed to have conjugal relations after ordination. They were required to make a vow of perfect and perpetual continence after ordination even though they were permitted to live with their wives. Moreover, no priest was allowed to marry after ordination [For example, see the canons of the Councils of Elvira (305), of Nicea (325), of Arles (314), and of Neoceasarea (314-25)].
The problem, of course, was that some married priests did not honor their vow of continence. Moreover, during the early Middle Ages, the Holy See could not exercise much control over disobedient married clerics. However, from the fourth century through the tenth century, popes continued to issue decrees mandating perfect clerical continence after ordination. It wasn't until Pope St. Gregory VII (1073-85) became pope that the papacy had become powerful enough to enforce its discipline. The First Lateran Synod of 1074 required all priests to take a vow of celibacy upon ordination and it forbade laypeople from receiving the sacraments from "unchaste priests." In 1123 the First Lateran Council declared the marriages of all higher clerics (deacons, priests, and bishops) to be invalid. The Second Lateran Counil (1139) prohibited married men from receiving Holy Orders.
The history of clerical celibacy in the Western Church is not well known or understood by most Catholics. Rent-a-priest wants to exploit the ignorance of the average Catholic to advance its own agenda.
Marajade, I'm curious. Is this in recent years with our newest Bishop Thomas Olmstead? Or was it with the previous (and I'll ad disgraced) bishop O'Brien and his supporting staff?
What you are saying should concern all Catholics in the diocese of Phoenix.
Good question - I'm confused on this point as well. I assume there's such a thing as "defrocking" a priest, but does that ever happen where the (ex-)priest isn't excommunicated at the same time?
Yes - it can happen if a priest resigns his vows and enters non consecrated life.
I apologize. That is why it is always better to present facts with a post. Too much hearsay especially when it comes to the Catholic Church.
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