Posted on 08/13/2006 7:31:18 AM PDT by Gamecock
Who are we? CITI is a lay organization that locates, recruits, and promotes the availability of married and other resigned Roman Catholic priests to fill the spiritual needs of God's people. According to church law (canon law), "Once a priest, always a priest." Therefore, married priests are not "ex" or "former" priests, they are still priests. In fact, Canon Law says they cannot refuse to ministry to someone who asks (Canon 843). Other canons
Whom do we serve? With a growing number of Catholics no longer attending church, more than 70 percent by a recent survey (CARA, 1996), and the growing shortage of un-married parish priests, married Roman Catholic priests are available for spiritual and sacramental ministry to anyone who asks for their help. They 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. Jesus always acted quickly to help people. Jesus never turned anyone away, and neither will married priests. Our ministry is ecumenical and open to Christians of all traditions.
Our ministries? Married priests provide spiritual guidance, counseling, home Masses, first or second marriages, funerals, confession, and other spiritual services. Like the early church that was closest to Jesus, the ministry is home-based. Married priests make "house calls". We are working towards the day when church authorities will welcome married Roman Catholic priests back to their local parishes. Many bishops clandestinely support the peacemaking efforts of Celibacy Is The Issue and look forward to the day when the officials at the Vatican will allow them to welcome married priests back into full parish ministry.
All contributions are tax deductible CITI Ministries is a tax-deductible (501.c3) charity. Your contributions fund our toll-free number (1-800-PRIEST 9), this web site, an interactive Internet and other discussion forums for married priests, and many opportunities to resolve issues affecting the Catholic Church as well as healing services to be scheduled throughout the country. Never before in the history of the church or in the history of Catholic church reform has there been such an opportunity to effect optional celibacy and restore integrity in the Church. Catholics are sitting in the driver's seat. All they need to do is invite married priests to celebrate Mass in priest-less parishes. Recently a canon lawyer at Leuven University chose CITI and Rentapriest for her dissertation study. Her conclusion is that the people have the right to call upon married priests for ministry. (A copy is available in our online Bookstore). Canon Law says they can and that married priests cannot refuse the request (Canon 843). Let's work together and make this happen. Your financial assistance will help us make more people aware through various efforts.
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from the "Quick facts" secton of the web page:
One out of every three Roman Catholic priests in the United States has transitioned from celibacy to the married priesthood. The total is over 20,000 - that's an average of over 400 married priests per state who are available to serve in their local parishes. There are over 110,000 married priests world-wide. In recent polls, more than seventy percent of American Catholics favor a married priesthood.
It is important to make some distinctions in order to fully understand the significance of the married priesthood in today's Church:
Priest / Cleric - Priesthood is a vocation, a spiritual calling from God to serve. The status of Cleric is a political position of authority in the institutional church. Because we have married, we have been dismissed from the clerical state. We are no longer clerics (office-holders) in the Church's hierarchy, but we retain the fullness of the priesthood. We are often referred to as "ex-priests". That term is inaccurate. We are really "ex-clerics". Ordination to the priesthood is permanent. One is ordained to be a priest, not a cleric. Holy Orders is a sacrament which confers priesthood. Priesthood is about spirituality and treating people as Jesus did in the Gospels. Being a Cleric is about having a special position in the church. Although we do not have clerical status, privilege, and support, we are still priests in good standing by virtue of Church law Canon 290, our education and ordination as priests, and twelve centuries of Roman Catholic tradition. The sacraments we provide are valid sacraments. For these reasons, we are now "married Roman Catholic priests". Once a priest, always a priest!
Priesthood / Mandatory Celibacy - The two are usually equated, but they are not the same. Good physicians are still good physicians - whether they are single or married. For the first fourteen centuries of our Church's history, priests, bishops, and 39 popes were married. Married priests and celibate priests worked side by side in service to the people of God. The majority of the celibate priests were monks. A string of worldly medieval popes worked to impose mandatory celibacy on the priesthood in order to centralize political power in Rome and seize the land of the married priest families throughout Europe. They succeeded at the Second Lateran Council in 1139. Married priests were forced to choose between their families and the priesthood they so loved. It has almost been forgotten that the married priesthood is the original and traditional priesthood of our Roman Catholic Church.
Today, God seems to be reviving the married priesthood, one priest at a time. Each married priest describes his departure from the professed-celibate clerical state as the following of a spiritual journey - one that has led him to marriage and family life - and back to the original and traditional priesthood of our Roman Catholic tradition. With thirty percent of priests now married, we feel that God is calling us back to our original balance and sending a clear message about the role of women in the Church. We believe that women have equal rights and the same potential as men for spiritual service in our Church. Married priests honor the feminine.
Most Catholics are unaware that Rome is ordaining married Protestant ministers into the priesthood and assigning them to parishes here in the United States. Rome is allowing them to remain married and providing support for their families. In ordaining to the priesthood over one hundred married Protestant ministers, the Vatican has, in effect, re-established the married priesthood in today's Roman Catholic Church. They have acted upon Pope John Paul II’s public statement that celibacy is not necessary for priesthood. By ordaining married Protestant ministers to the priesthood, the Vatican has changed the rules. In doing so, it has set a precedent that Catholics can now use to call upon their own married priests for Mass and the sacraments. By its own example, Rome has clearly announced to the world a new public acceptance of married Roman Catholic priests.
We married priests have added the sacrament of Marriage to the sacrament of Holy Orders. We now have experience in raising families and surviving in the real world. These experiences have given us insights and competencies that we would not have achieved if we had remained celibate clerics. People who know us believe that marriage has enriched our priesthood. They admire our integrity and our readiness to serve as priests when we are asked. Many bishops secretly support us and hope that the next Pope will reinstate all married priests so that the parish closures will end.
In response to a growing pastoral need and requests from individual Catholics, we married priests are offering our priesthood, not as clerics (office-holders in the institutional church), but as your equals, your spiritual friends, to help those in need through the Rent A Priest program.
Rent A Priest, 1-800-PRIEST-9, is a referral program that was started by Louise Haggett. Louise is a traditional Catholic grandmother who loves the Church and works to animate married priests and put them in contact with Catholics in need of spiritual or sacramental help. Please read Louise's letter to learn about the beginnings of CITI and the Rent A Priest program.
Our motto: Jesus never turned anyone away, and neither will married Roman Catholic priests.
These sick people are NOT Catholic Priests.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/959544/posts
As told by Gramsci over 100 years ago ....
...E. Both Capitalism and Judaeo-Christian culture must be destroyed before a Communist revolution can succeed
......1. Religious sentiment cannot be destroyed through legislation, as Lenin believed, but must be redirected from the divine to the state
.........a. Terror will only drive Religion underground
.........b. Religion will then reemerge when Leninism fails
.........c. So Religion must be destroyed in the minds of men
......2. Infiltrate religious academies and become priests and clergymen
.........a. Subtly promote heresy within religious organizations
.........b. Infiltrators must act so as to discredit the church
............(1) Cause financial and sexual scandals
............(2) See that this is given a high profile in the news
............(3) Like-minded infiltrators in the media will cooperate
......3. Once religion is discredited from within, continuously promote the idea that only the state can solve the problems that have been traditionally brought before the church
Everything that he stated is being 'religiously' followed by the progressive left in this country... so well that that many believe that Christianity is now the blame instead of the salvation.
The whole thingy just seems kinda loose and slippery to me. That's the picture I'm getting out of it.
"These sick people are NOT Catholic Priests."
Then why in the article I posted a link to does it say that a lawyer representing the Catholic Church defend them?
Hopefully he will grow a pair someday, face his accusers, and confess and repent for his sins.
And as a Catholic, how do you feel about the whole situation?
because they're frauds (those liberals who "represent" the Church...and I don't mean the lawyers.)
Do you know if that one priest we keep talking about is still a priest?
I really don't want to go into it on this thread (I apologize for already kinda hijacking it).
But that said, I know the Church has been infected with the stench of liberalism for over well over a century now, and it's festering into something unrecognizable than what it was even 40 years ago.
Even with these "Rent-A-Priest" phonies, our (many, not all) heretic bishops, the smoke of satan and communism is trying to slink it's way through the top, in order to destroy it.
It won't happen, we have God's Word on that. But it's a struggle.
My guess, The Vatican will await a verdict on him (if we ever find him and prosecute him). At that point, he will be dealt with.
In the meantime, I fear those who encounter him, completely ignorant of his history.
Huh? Who cares how many links you provided on the same subject. You made a contention that has been disproved but rather than admit that, you shift the subject to a numbers game on links. Sheesh! Phenomenal!
But like I posted up earlier in the thread, even though we have a contract with them at work, they won't even come to perform the services we want and leave us to turn to volunteers who aren't "real" priests to conduct services.
What are believers supposed to do?
"The Vatican will await a verdict on him..."
Even though he went against his own word and flew the coup? That seems amazing to me.
But when you say "services" are these prayer services?
Laity can do that. That is completely different from having Mass.
No one but a priest can say Mass. If "Mass" is performed and communion is distributed by a lay person, then the Diocese most certainly will be interested. That is completely against Canon Law.
And I know this Bishop will put a halt to it.
But as for the dilemma at your work, perhaps going to a seperate Religious order priest (not a Diocesan priest) might help you out.
Fair warning though, there is a huge shortage of priests and their availability. Not a good thing.
Especially for we believers ;o)
We are talking about Mass which they are declining to perform. So we do indeed have volunteers who aren't priests perform Mass for us.
Yes, it is true. These men, even though they are outside of the RCC, they are still priests. This is because the RCC believes and teaches that ordination (Holy Orders) is one of the seven Sacraments. When a man is ordained an indelible mark is placed on his soul. He is thus forever consecrated to service of God. Of the seven Sacraments, only two, Baptism and Holy Orders are permanent, leaving an indelible mark on the soul and they can be received only once. Also, neither can ever be undone or invalidated. Even the Pope has not the power to undo a valid Baptism or Ordination, nor can an individual by rejecting his Baptism or Ordination ever undo the permanency of his Baptism or Ordination, nor does one's moral depravity, no matter how disgusting invalidate these two sacraments. This is the sacramental aspect of the priesthood.
Canon Law regulates the priest's ability to function as a priest. No priest may set up shop wherever he pleases. Canon Law requires that he be under the jurisdiction of a Bishop to offer Mass and to provide the Sacraments. A priest receives jurisdiction in one of three ways.
1) He may be incardinated into a specific diocese. Simply put, he is hired by the Bishop to work in the diocese.
2) If the priest belongs to an order of priests, such as the Franciscans, the order is invited by the Bishop to work in the diocese, and jurisdiction is supplied for the priests who are sent by the order. Think of order priests as working for one agency that supplies manpower to another agency.
3) Temporary jurisdiction is often times granted to visiting priests who are in a diocese for various reasons, such as missionaries preaching on behalf of the missions, priests who are attending an university to further their education, or perhaps visiting relatives, and so forth.
The purpose of jurisdiction is to give the faithful reasonable assurance that the man celebrating Mass, hearing confessions, witnessing weddings, etc., is an ordained priest, recognised by the RCC, and that he has the powers received through his ordination to validly and licitly effect the sacraments.
So where does this leave our friends at Rent-A-Priest? Well, they are correct, they are priests, as sacramentally their ordination can never be undone. They are forever priests. Legally, however, they cannot function as priests, as they are not under the jurisdiction of a Catholic Bishop in union with the Pope. They are in effect, free-lance priests who have set up their own independent shop.
I hope that this helps.
That is, if he were to be found innocent. Make sense?
" ... perhaps going to a seperate Religious order priest (not a Diocesan priest) might help you out."
We have a contract. We just can't violate it, and neither should the Catholic Church.
And for your suggestion, are talking about the same religious order priests above like the one who gave his word and then fled?
Gee, I always thought I was a decent person. Thanks for letting me know I'm scum because I'm a single man.
These kids know that? Who is doing the consecration?
The Diocese will not ignore that.
"The Diocese will not ignore that."
The Phx Diocese is who we have the contract who is denying them the services.
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