“Can someone, in a nutshell, explain why priests shouldn’t be allowed to marry if the principal reason they were barred from it so long ago had to do with the inheritance of property?”
False premise. Celibacy wasn’t about inheritance of property.
Celibacy is a practice that goes back to apostolic times.
Celibacy also exists within the Orthodox Church as well as within the Eastern Catholic Churches, side-by-side with married priests. In fact, in the Orthodox Church, only celibate priests may become bishops.
The practice of the early Church was that married men who were priests would be continent (abstain from sexual relations) prior to the celebration of the Mass/Divine Liturgy. Often, married men who became priests voluntarily became permanently continent.
In the West, it became the norm for priests to celebrate Mass daily. This meant that these men had to embrace permanent continence. In part from that arose the discipline of mandatory celibacy for priests in the Latin Church.
I've pinged a few among many posters who can provide a more complete explanation.
sitetest
Thank you very much, that’s just what I was looking for.