Celibacy Defended by EWTN's Fr. Levis

Celibacy Question from Leonora on 09-09-2003:
I am sorry, Fr Levis, I just do not understand your strong opposition to optional celibacy for the priesthood. How can it be so bad? marriage is a wonderful thing, indeed, a sacrament

Answer by Fr. Robert J. Levis on 09-10-2003:
Dear Leonora, Celibacy will remain a characteristic of the Western Priesthood for the following reasons: 1. The priest is considered a groom, like Christ the Groom, married to the whole Church. This is an ancient patriarchal notion and a good one. This Christian union is monogamous, one husband with one wife. The priest's wife is his people whome he serves without counting the effort. 2. The vocation of the priest is to stand in the person of Christ who was celibacy thruout his whole life. 3. The primary purpose of marriage is the rearing and training of children, an enormous task. An essential duty of the priest is to administer the Sacraments most especially the HOly Eucharist, a most solemn duty which requires a detached life, much solitary prayer, and training for homiletic work. 4. The priest is considered the "sexless one", the man to whom all, men and women, may come in complete freedom and openness with their counselling problems. Any woman can see the priest who is not some woman's husband, which is a freedom for her and an advantage for the independent priest. 5. Imagine the costs of providing for a priest and his non-conceptive family, a real practical consideration in these times. God bless.
Fr. Bob Levis

Re: Margaret's post on celibacy Question from J. Koch on 09-09-2003:
As was mentioned on previous posts, the practice of celibacy in the priesthood is a church discipline, not a doctrine based on biblical evidence nor of the teachings of Christ. It is an admirable enough state for those who choose it, but because it is against natural law and the design of God (see Genesis) and against the natural emotional, psychological and physiological nature of the human species, it is difficult to practice for a lifetime.
Margaret mentions that she has heard 'so many stories about Protestant ministers and other church leaders having a divorce, living a lavish life' etc.. That was the same answer the nuns gave us when I was in grade school over fifty years ago. And it's a true fact. But the 'celibate' is not without serious problems, e.g. the anomalies having surfaced about sexual abuses being traced back for decades and decades. Being able to discern a man's ability to sustain a most unnatural state, i.e. life-long celibacy, would require the powers of a visionary. Hence, it can be expected that these problems will continue to plague the church until the celibacy discipline is altered.

Answer by Fr. Robert J. Levis on 09-10-2003:
Dear Friend, I object strenuously to your statement that celibacy is unnatural. I have been celibate now for 82 years trying to the best of my ability to be of service to all. The celibate priest is called by vocation, by God himself to be free of marital responsibilities in order to be more free for his ministry. The vocation is not a comm0n one, but rather a special one. It is a profession, not a career. I recall a dedicated physician who claimed he would have been much happier and more fruitful if he had never married. Ideally, he urged all doctors not to marry for more freedom for their patients, and 2. not to rear sons who often are neglected because of his pressing practice. (The record shows some truth here, for sons, not for daughters.) The Priesthood is a radical vocation, one aiming at perfection by reason of its nature and duties. The Priest is a light shining in the darkness of the modern secular world. His fullest energy must be spent on his vocation. A mediocre priest, one attempting to serve two masters or ends, is always miserable. A married man facing failure of any sort has his wife to support and help him. The priest goes to Christ, the living source and substance of all his confidence, strength, and endurance. He must be free to be able to spend time with Christ, especially the Eucharistic Lord. Friend, I know many, many men and women who remain unmarried and live very fulfilled and happy lives. They too must object to your judgment that celibacy is unnatural. You might have fallen into the modern trap that holds with Freud and Kinsey and others, especially movie people, that sexual release is necessary. Don't hold your breath for a married Priesthood. It won't appear.
Fr. Bob Levis

The priest is considered the "sexless one", the man to whom all, men and women, may come in complete freedom and openness with their counselling problems. Any woman can see the priest who is not some woman's husband, which is a freedom for her and an advantage for the independent priest.

Women go to married counselors all the time. They also go the married Anglican converts who have been ordained to the priesthood.

Any person who requires that a priest be celibate in order to receive counselling has bigger problems than they thought.

I recall a dedicated physician who claimed he would have been much happier and more fruitful if he had never married. Ideally, he urged all doctors not to marry for more freedom for their patients, and 2. not to rear sons who often are neglected because of his pressing practice. (The record shows some truth here, for sons, not for daughters.)

I wonder what this doctor's wife might have said.

Indeed, I wonder what this neanderthal's daughter might have said (if he said this; perhaps Fr. Levis is being a bit apocryphal).

I don't know any doctor whose practice has been inhibited by being married. Maybe some who have nagging wives might wish they had chosen celibacy, but, for those who have happy marriages, they seem to be able to mesh marriage and a physician's practice.

Indeed, I know married deacons who outwork even the most devoted priest, yet still manage to care for their wives and a family.

They don't play golf or go to the racetrack, however, as very many celibate priests do.

The priest is considered a groom, like Christ the Groom, married to the whole Church
The vocation of the priest is to stand in the person of Christ
The Priest is a light shining in the darkness of the modern secular world. His fullest energy must be spent on his vocation

These statements are TRANSCENDENT, and the issues you raise are IMMANENT.

But then, this is the very fault line between Catholicism and "liberal Catholicism": the former attends to the heavens, and the latter remains existentially on earth.

The British and the Roman Churches argued over this up to the seventh century. Along with a question of the dating of Ressurection Day and of tonsures. The latter issue is really imaterial, but I somehow think that the other two were resolved incorrectly, to the best of my understanding of scripture.

The scripture most pertinent to this passage seems to be missing:
Matt 19:10-12, ending with "He that is able to receive it, let him receive it."
Then there is Paul, the whole of 1 Cor 7. Here it is pointed out all the freedoms the unmarried have for serving the Lord, but too it is pointed out:
2 But, because of fornications, let each man have his own wife, and let each woman have her own husband.
9 But if they have not continency, let them marry: for it is better to marry than to burn.

things to consider in the practical world, as we have a practical, immanent, religion. Transcendency is nice, but neither Jesus nor Paul seem to expect it of that many people.
I am not knocking celibacy, Jesus indicates that some have the gift, or have made the decision or however you wish to look at it. And I would not recommend that anyone renege on their vows that they have made, it is a good and beautiful thing, with many benefits. I suppose that ideally speaking the church is saying that it is a rare gift, and it is a requirement of a rare profession - that of the Roman Catholic priest. If not everyone should take such vows, then not everyone should become a priest.
The problem is that many who take such vows do not seem to have the ability to keep them, and should never have made them in the first place. The question then becomes what to do about it.
More fundemental, however, are questions like: "what (or who) is a priest? what is a vicar? does an immanent Christ require a vicar in the first place, or does the very idea nullify His immanency (being within us)? Are there varying degrees of priesthood, and if so, what are they, how does one delineate them, or are those who are not celibate merely charlatans?" I think the answers to the questions would predetermine the answers to the question of celibacy, and a good many others.

The questions you raise are resolved by the Apostolic sweep of Church history.

As Fr. Cochini summarizes by quoting Augustine in his (Fr. Cochini's) definitive book Apostolic Origins of Priestly Celibacy:

what has been kept by the entire Church and was always maintained, without having been established by the councils, is regarded quite rightly as having been transmitted only by the apostolic authority"

Celibacy is an unwritten tradition of Apostolic origin, as Fr. Cochini writes, that was first canonically expressed in the 4th century. The mind of Christ, exhibited through the Church, guides us and brings us sacramental grace through the splendor of a celibate clergy.

I believe the correct response to this is prayerful awe, rather than pointless discussions of what a priest is, or mundane comparisons of Father Couchpotato vs Superman Deacon.

Paul also wrote:

"But I would have you to be without solicitude. He that is without a wife, is solicitous for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please God. But he that is with a wife, is solicitous for the things of the world, how he may please his wife: and he is divided. And the unmarried woman and the virgin thinketh on the things of the Lord, that she may be both holy in body and spirit. But she that is married thinketh on the things of the world, how she may please her husband. And this I speak to your profit: not to cast a snare upon you; but for that which is decent, and which may give you power to attend upon the Lord, without impediment." 1 Corinthians 7:32-35.

Ha Ha Ha...I read these threads and I see you constantly promoting a married priesthood.

So, if we get rid of celibacy, why not get rid of poverty and obedience also?

I was learnt that celibacy, poverty and obedience were Evangelical Counsels..("This distinction between the precepts of the Gospel, which are binding on all, and the counsels, which are the subject of the vocation of the comparatively few, has ever been maintained by the Catholic Church. It has been denied by heretics in all ages, and especially by many Protestants in the sixteenth and following centuries, on the ground that, inasmuch as all Christians are at all times bound, if they would keep God's Commandments, to do their utmost, and even so will fall short of perfect obedience, no distinction between precepts and counsels can rightly be made. The opponents of the Catholic doctrine base their opposition on such texts as Luke, xvii, 10, "When ye have done all that is commanded you, say, we are unprofitable servants". It is impossible, they say, to keep the Commandments adequately. To teach further "counsels" involves either the absurdity of advising what is far beyond all human capacity, or else the impiety of minimizing the commands of Almighty God. The Catholic doctrine, however, founded, as we have seen, upon the words of Christ in the Gospel, is also supported by St. Paul. In I Cor., vii, for instance, he not only presses home the duty incumbent on all Christians of keeping free from all sins of the flesh, and of fulfilling the obligations of the married state, if they have taken those obligations upon themselves, but also gives his "counsel" in favour of the unmarried state and of perfect chastity, on the ground that it is thus more possible to serve God with an undivided allegiance. so, if we are to embrace marriage to solve the current crisis, why not alos embrace wealth and willfullness as ways to strengthen/populate the priesthoood, or, is sex the only answer to this, transitory, crisis?

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