Posted on 01/30/2011 2:01:52 PM PST by Alex Murphy
The London Catholic Herald blogger Anna Arco blogs the news that Pope Benedict XVI “called for the Church to investigate priestly celibacy”, in 1970 when he was a young priest.
She notes a German newspaper report that he signed a petition that suggested the Church re-examine the obligation of priestly celibacy.
The memorandum was drawn up in the face of a shortage of priests and other signatories included Karl Rahner and the future cardinals Karl Lehmann and Walter Kasper.
If there weren’t enough priests, the document said, then the “Church quite simply has a responsibility to take up certain modifications”.
The blog points out that the document’s release coincides with a renewed debate on priestly celibacy after prominent German politicians called for the Church to change the teaching on priestly celibacy in the face of a serious lack of priests.
But it ensures that the priesthood is a haven for gays. It almost always has been.
I personally don't much care which way the Church goes on celibacy (leaving aside the unacceptable notion of actually allowing men already ordained to marry, which is completely unprecedented in traditional Christianity), but your reasoning here is fallacious. There is no reason to believe that a celibate priesthood must become a haven for gays other than the assertion that it is so. Gays can do any number of jobs which give greater access to children, and there is ever diminishing causes why a gay man would feel the need to "hide" in a job which conveniently explains his choice not to marry. Our society does not particularly stigmatize homosexuals, and so they are able to live openly whenever they want, and engage in whatever methods they like to find interested partners. The priesthood, if anything, would be a bad choice.
Listen to the Village People.
Why do you non-Catholics feel a need to butt into Catholic Church matters? Is it maybe because you are just winging it, and thus, altogether lack conviction about the veracity of your religion?
I'm a Catholic, I could care less if Billy Graham was married to another man. To me the only true faith is Catholic and all other religions are false and paths to perdition, what do I care about their details.
But... all of those reasons are stupid
Well, you have a point. It IS a Catholic issue, and not one that concerns me, as I’m Protestant.
I don’t feel like I’m “butting into Catholic Church matters”, as you put it, but stating facts regarding the topic posted here on FR.
If you’re convinced the Catholic Religion is the only true religion, then you shouldn’t have any problem supporting your church beliefs with scriptures from the Holy Bible.
That statement indicates that you possess a very poor comprehension of Scripture. More than likely no one has ever read to you those passages of Scripture where celibacy is highly praised.
Paul talks about his celibate life, how he doesn’t have a family to worry about, but he goes on to say that people should marry if they couldn’t remain celibate.
St. Paul also speaks of serving God without impediment. I guess you simply glossed over that part of 1 Corinthians.
St. Paul’s advice to Timothy calling the forbidding of marriage a “doctrine of devils”.
The Church doesn't forbid marriage unlike the Gnostics, Marcionites, Encratites, Manicheans, and other ancient heretics to whom St. Paul was referring who absolutely forbid marriage to anyone due to their belief that all flesh emanated from an evil principle. The Church asks those seeking ordination in the Latin Rite to choose between having a family and sacrificing all, as the Apostles did, to serve the Lord. By the way please provide the "doctrine of devils" passage citation.
To say that a priest can better serve the Lord if he’s unmarried doesn’t make sense.
Christ, the Apostles and St. Paul disagree.
It really hurts the Lord’s work when committed Christians don’t have children.
It hurts the Lord when self proclaimed Christians fail to discern the difference between the common priesthood of the believer and the ministerial Priesthood of the ordained.
What do you base that assertion on?
It's your DIY invented system that requires "supporting a belief from scriptures". Your question is analogous to me asking a YOPIOS to support his belief from the Early Church Fathers and dogma. We are not on the same page.
If you really wanted to know, you wouldn't be here asking, since you can just Google it from real Catholic sources.
You certainly are expending a lot of effort on a topic that doesn't concern you. However, you should be asking yourself why so few, if any, protestant ministers, particularly those who tout themselves as "Bible believers", choose to emulate the example set by the Apostles, St. Paul and Christ Himself.
I don’t feel like I’m “butting into Catholic Church matters”, as you put it, but stating facts regarding the topic posted here on FR.
You're stating your opinion, not facts.
Your response to me that I have “very poor comprehension of scripture” would have validity if you had posted a scripture that backed the Catholic belief that church leaders are forbidden to marry.
Doesn’t the Catholic Church look at Peter as the head of the church? He was married because the bible says, “When Jesus came into Peter’s house, he saw Peter’s mother-in-law lying in bed with a fever.” Matthew 8:14 You just wrote that Jesus Christ disagreed with what I said, but he chose Peter as one of his disciples, and Catholics believe he’s the first pope.
If I “glossed over 1 Corinthians”, as you say, then please post the scripture that says Priests/Rabbis/Church Leaders are to remain celibate. In 1 Timothy 3:2, it states...”Let the deacons be the husbands of one wife, ruling their children and their own houses well.”
If the Catholic Church doesn’t forbid marriage, then are you saying that a Catholic Priest would be allowed to marry, and continue to carry out his duties as Priest?
Tertullian is an early church father, and he was married.
Peter was married. Is his example one to be followed?
well, is it not commonsense that if Jesus chose 12 apostles of men around his age that some would have had families?
Because it doesn’t end up pressuring a kid to live up to difficult expectations
Tertullian was a layman, not a priest. How is his marital status relevant?
I'm sure you're familiar with 1 Cor 7:32-34, where Paul specifically teaches that the unmarried state frees one to better serve God.
How do you get rid of the gays?
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The first is what sort of methods the church uses to screen out unfit men.
The "screening" process is rather extensive today (though in the past it hasn't been). Upon applying to a diocese, a man goes through interviews, needs letters of recommendation from clergy and from other people, and takes an extensive psychological examination. Once in seminary (which is usually between 6 and 8 years total), seminary formators have the opportunity to examine the man is his interactions with others; he is evaluated yearly, for many of these years he is evaluated with faculty, self, and peer evaluations. His interactions during pastoral work are evaluated and reported back to the seminary/diocese. If problems arise, they are addressed - be that through the seminarian working with a formator, working with a psychologist (if the situation warrants it), taking a pastoral formation year, or being asked to leave the formation program entirely.
It's not a perfect system, and not every diocese and seminary implements it perfectly, but I think it does a pretty thorough job of sifting out unfit candidates.
In one sense, we could do it tomorrow - doctrinally, there is no issue with married men being ordained.
However, there are several reasons why we continue not to. Among them include:
- the priest's heart would be divided between his wife and his flock - whether or not he has minor children, this would be the case (not that that has not prevented the acceptance of married clergy from Protestant denominations into priesthood in the Latin Rite of the Church)
- If we're following the book entirely and maintaining the traditions of the Catholic Church even where married clergy are concerned, the priest would still be required to be continent even if married - that is, no sex. This hasn't been emphasized in the specific cases of married priests and in the more widespread situation of married permanent deacons.
- The married priest lacks the flexibility to minister and pray as he needs to.
- It inhibits the Christological and Ecclesiological symbolism of the priest, and lacks the radical witness to the Kingdom that is particularly necessary in today's society.
- It would make formation very, very difficult, in the sense that the married seminarian would be separate from the rest of the community; likewise, it would require the wife to be breadwinner during the 6 years of studies, in order to provide for a home outside of the seminary.
Others might disagree, particularly our Eastern Catholic/Orthodox brethren, and that's fine. You can find more in Paul VI's encyclical Sacerdotalis Caelibatus; I would suggest reading it if you really want to understand why.
The Apostle Peter was married, right up until the time of his martydom.
In the eastern Church, the monks still retains a special place, more so than in the West, these days. Fact is that it is impossible for a family man to perform the heroic deeds ascribed to the early Jesuit missionaries, or indeed, going back a thousand years before, the Irish monks who missionized all western Europe, following the all-in model of St.Patrick himself. The married priest model of the Greek Church and the married English clergy are not to be scorned. But it is interesting that John Wesley—the great English evangelist and a product of a clerical family—was himself a lousy husband, because he was never there.
Our eastern brothers have another problem. Finding a woman who will endure the relative poverty of clerical life. Which is why so many Greek priests are involuntarily celibate.
Besides the gay priests do not want married men and their wives snooping around.
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