Of course "evidence" can be found of general celibacy, but even the OT priesthood was not celibate. John the Baptist's dad was a priest, Moses was married, Aaron was married. Who is the RCC to invent a Christian "Priesthood" which itself is my bigger complaing, then then to impose celibacy on them. There is an awful lot more "biblical evidence" that there is not such thing as a Christian "Priest" in the RC sense. There are entire paragraphs of "biblical evidence" that the standard minister role, the elder, must be married and have kids with only a few exceptions being unmarried.
FatherofEight
Wrong. Once again, learn about Melchisedech. It's fairly evident that you aren't that well versed in Scripture after all.
“Of course "evidence" can be found”
Yes, but your original post said this was not in the Bible.
“Who is the RCC to invent a Christian "Priesthood" ”
The Roman Catholic Church is the Church Christ established on earth 2,000 years ago:
“Jesus replied, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven." (Matt. 16:17-19)” Here Christ promised that Peter’s decisions as leader of the Church would be binding in heaven. From John 21:21-24 “Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you. And with that he breathed on them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone his sins, they are forgiven; if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.” There was one other time in the Bible that God breathed on man - when God breathed life into Adam. This was something very special. Christ was creating his priesthood, and clearly giving this priesthood special gifts. These gifts could not have been intended to die with the Apostles, unless Christ was planning a very quick return.
“There are entire paragraphs of "biblical evidence" that the standard minister role, the elder, must be married”
The point of Paul's teaching is not that a man must be married in order to be a bishop, but that a bishop may not be married more than once. If this passage meant that a bishop had to be married, Paul would have been in violation of his own rule (1 Cor. 7:7-8, 9:5). A rule forbidding a man to have more than one wife does not order him to have at least one. A man who never marries does not violate the rule. Also, Paul, being a bishop who ordained other men to be bishops (1 Tim.1:6), would have been a hypocrite if he enjoined such a rule ("to be a bishop you must be married") and then, by his own admission (1 Cor. 7:8-9) ignored his own rule.