Posted on 06/11/2014 9:04:51 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
ROME — Pope Francis says he believes that Roman Catholic priests should be celibate but the rule was not an unchangeable dogma and “the door is always open” to change.
Francis made similar comments when he was archbishop of Buenos Aires but his remarks to reporters on a plane returning from a Middle East trip were the first he has made since becoming pope.
“Celibacy is not a dogma,” he said Monday in answer to a question about whether the Catholic Church could some day allow priests to marry as they can in some other Christian Churches.
“It is a rule of life that I appreciate very much and I think it is a gift for the Church but since it is not a dogma, the door is always open,” he said.
The Church teaches that a priest should dedicate himself totally to his vocation, essentially taking the Church as his spouse, in order to help fulfill its mission.
However while priestly celibacy is a tradition going back around 1,000 years, it is not considered dogma, or an unchangeable piece of Church teaching.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.nationalpost.com ...
Let the priests revert back to Deacons then.
You may be reading too much into that. If someone is healed they may have a burst of energy and wish to help. Doesn’t prove that Paul did not have a wife. Doesn’t prove that he did have a wife either actually. Not much in scripture one way or the other on that subject. :-)
I was just talking to my son about this - a Catholic church in a small town near us has just had computers confiscated because of child pornography.
It is neither natural or Biblical to require those who lead the church to remain single, and therefore celibate. This eliminates the majority of good Catholics right off the bat.
This is the perfect setting to foster exactly what has happened. Joining the priesthood would be a perfect cover for a homosexual to hold a job, hold a highly respectable position, not have to explain to anyone why he isn’t married, and have easy access to children, in a position of trust and authority.
A disaster waiting to happen, IMHO.
I would tend to agree with SoFloFreeper on this; it would not be a bad idea to allow priests to marry. The reason I have is a pragmatic one. Catholics, like most other Christians, often look to the priest for guidance in their lives. One aspect of our lives that often presents difficult situations is our relationships with our spouses. A married priest is more likely to have a better understanding of marital problems than an unmarried, celibate one. Some things cannot be learned in seminary, but only by experience.
If I am not mistaken, in the Orthodox rite, priests aspiring to leadership positions in the church hierarchy are NOT allowed to be married, but those who are the equivalent of the parish priests in the Roman rite are. I would think such a rule would work well for the Roman rite as well.
That’s what all the liberal Catholics invariably believe too, excepting they actually hate the discipline. In fact, try to find a liberal of any faith that accepts abortion, ‘gay marriage,’ and female clergy that also thinks the Catholic discipline of celibacy is valuable and should be continued. They just get there from a completely different direction.
Freegards
There are married priests in the Roman Catholic Church.
What has happened, quietly over several years, and with little publicity, is that ordained Lutheran and Anglican pastors who also happen to be married, are admitted to the priesthood as converts. There is really only one difference in how the Catholics, the Anglicans, and the Lutherans perceive the Pope, otherwise the doctrine as taught in the seminaries differs little.
Catholics consider the Pope as sitting on the throne of Peter, Lutherans and Anglicans consider the Pope to be only a most superior bishop. With the Ecumenical movement, the Lutherans, Anglicans and the Catholics found themselves more alike than different.
Currently, these converted priests are not allowed to serve the Eucharist. It would not require more than the permission of the College of Cardinals and the Pope himself to rectify this situation.
Any legitimate mode of life has some advantages and some disadvantages.
Or at least *most* of them are.Anglican priests in various Western countries (US,Canada,Europe,Australia,etc) who convert to Catholicism and are then allowed to serve as Catholic priests are allowed to be married.So why not *all* priests?
Choosing to set aside marriage for the sake of dedication to something else should always be an option for someone who wants to do it. But as Paul says, “It is better to marry than to burn [with passion].”
I've never had contact with a married priests but I know they exist.Are you sure of this? How can they be genuine "priests" while being restricted in this central way?
Then what happens vis-a’-vis gay marriage?
Gay married priests?
I could see that if a single minister later wished to marry, he ought to be expected to reaffirm his ministry before continuing on after the wedding. Just so that everybody is clear that the marriage is not supervening his idea of his responsibilities for the sake of the Lord.
Singlehood can help Protestant ministers, too, better concentrate on the calling of the Lord. I’ve seen it happen, where the wife passed away unexpectedly and the minister remained an unmarried widower.
There are virtues to being married and virtues to singlehood. There is no need to disparage either condition.
Hmm... do they get to bless it, but then someone else serves it?
Just two days ago we were told by FRoman Catholic apologists that the current Pope can’t change doctrine/dogma because it was set in stone long ago. He, we were told, is just the overseer.
Oh well. Nothing to see here.
I'd have no problem with that at all.Regarding his dedication to the Lord's work the closest I've come to this is to see the dedication of married physicians to their patients.Being a physician,like being a priest,is a 24/7/365 calling and I know from personal experience (20 years working at a large hospital) that the married ones still get up at 3AM when a patient needs him/her and also works an 18 day when necessary.
argumentum ex silentio and argumentum ad ignorantiamare generally considered at least weak, in the former case, and fallacious in the later, sometimes in both.
If comparing the conditions, maybe advocates of the church tradition would point out that he was married prior to believing... MAYBE.
RE: Just two days ago we were told by FRoman Catholic apologists that the current Pope can’t change doctrine/dogma because it was set in stone long ago.
Let’s just remind ourselves — Celibacy for Priest is NOT a Dogma ( see article ).
Evangelical dogma is closer to the original sources in the bible than Catholic dogma is. With the Catholic system, the dogma can evolve through prophecy under certain conditions. You can believe or disbelieve whether that’s really reflective of the Lord’s will for Christians (I disbelieve it), but that’s how the Catholic church conducts themselves. And it’s more subtle than a crass “Oh, the pope changed it.” There’s kind of a consensus process they go through.
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