Posted on 01/26/2005 8:45:26 AM PST by tvn
TONY EASTLEY: With their numbers in radical decline, Australia's Catholic Priests are urging the Vatican to overturn its ban on married clergy. The National Council of Priests has written to Rome urging it to re-consider the rules on celibacy. There's concern that sex and marriage have become an obstacle to recruitment.
Priests argue that their dwindling ranks could be boosted if they were allowed to marry and have families. Presently, only Priests who convert to Catholicism from other churches are allowed to be married.
The parish priest of Melbourne St Simon's Church, Father Martin Dixon, sits on the executive committee of the National Council of Priests.
AM's Nick Grimm spoke to Father Dixon.
MARTIN DIXON: Well, I think the issue of married Priests can be an issue that should be looked at and can be looked at. Marriage is not a bar to Priesthood, there are a large number of married men who are Priests in Australia already.
Melbourne has two of them here already, so it is happening, and I suppose we're saying, why just restrict it to particularly men who are Anglican Priests who have now become Catholics? It should be open to all men.
NICK GRIMM: The vow of celibacy has long been one of the defining features of the Catholic Priesthood though, hasn't it?
MARTIN DIXON: It has been, but it hasn't been for the whole history of the church. Half the history of the church has been married clergy, and the clergy in the beginning were married. Peter had his wife the first Apostle. So, it's never been a restrictor for a long time within the church.
NICK GRIMM: So you would argue that this is a tradition which shouldn't be considered a sacred tradition?
MARTIN DIXON: No, I think it's one of the traditions we have to look at in the light of the present situation of the world we live in. It's not an unchangeable thing. The practice has been shown now that we can ordain married men. It therefore is not unchangeable.
NICK GRIMM: It is argued at times, isn't it, that there's a view that Priests can't really minister effectively if they live a life which is still quite remote from the everyday experience of many people?
MARTIN DIXON: If you live in the Parish and you're working among the people, you're not remote. You know the feelings, you know the pains, and you know the joys of it. You don't have to be married to know what it's like.
TONY EASTLEY: The parish priest of Melbourne St Simon's Church, Father Martin Dixon, speaking with AM's Nick Grimm.
Are you calling me a heretic?
Never Mind.! Im getting real tired. Im turning in.
I'm going for real now.
ohhhh.....youre talking of lay people?
The thought occurs to me that allowing married priests would put pressure for a revision of Church doctrine about contraception. In a way, the two go together like bacon and eggs.
No, I meant Marcion - sorry if I gave you that impression.
Mar 1:30 Now Simon's [Peter's] mother-in-law lay ill with a fever, and immediately they told him about her.
1Ti 4:1 Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons,
1Ti 4:2 through the insincerity of liars whose consciences are seared,
1Ti 4:3 who forbid marriage and require abstinence from foods that God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth.
I doubt Jesus was urging celibacy upon his disciples. That quote comes at the end of a general discussion on marriage and divorce. Jesus repeats the Genesis command that a man should leave his parents and be joined to wife, and that the two shall become one flesh (this is the only passage in all Scripture repeated by Moses, Jesus and Paul).
In the passage you quoted, the teaching Jesus said many cannot accept is the one He just gave: any man who divorces his wife for a reason other than infidelity and then marries another committs adultery. In the ancient world, it was common for a man to toss his wife out on the street and marry someone else. The disciples seem to be saying that so as to avoid committing adultery, just avoid getting married. Jesus responds that if they avoid getting married, then they should try to make themselves eunuchs. In another words, fidelity when married, celibacy when not married.
They had, actually. Trent decided to refrain from a definition, but infallibility of the Pope was already widely held in the Church and a subject of controversy with the Reformers.
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