I did say the Church’s policy of compulsory clerical celibacy was not widely enforced, implemented, and institutionalized until the Middle Ages as many if not most priest, bishops (and yes a number of the early popes) were married men.
Clerical celibacy was institutionalized and enforce from the 4th century. As a general practice to goes back even further. Your reference to the contrary in the Middle Ages was the result of the general corruption in those centuries and was contrary to what was still the stated law. Even then there were constant attempts, however unsuccessful, by the Church to enforce the then ancient discipline. There are plenty of arguments pro and con about clerical celibacy without having to resort to false history. Such appeals only weaken, not strengthen, your argument.
No doubt there were Church leaders from the earliest clamoring for compulsory clerical celibacy, most notably Damian among others. Some of these Church leaders had issues with women. Some had issues with the mere idea of physical intimacy-—even that between a husband and a wife. A whole cottage industry developed around this ideology including turning Mary into a perpetual virgin even though the Gospel of Luke only states that Mary was a virgin only up to the time of her conception of Jesus. They would have us believe that Mary and Joseph never consummated their marriage and Jesus’s brothers and sisters mentioned in the Gospels were not really his brothers and sisters but rather cousins. It amazes me how far some will go to propagate this ideology around celibacy which I think is entirely misguided and to some extent twisted. The Lord commands us to be fruitful and multiply. Physical intimacy between a husband and a wife is a precious gift from God, not an act of defilement, certainly something the Lord would not have denied to Mary and Joseph.
With respects to the institutionalization of clerical celibacy according to the New York Daily News 7/14/2014:
“Celibacy was optional for priests until it was voted a Vatican rule at the First Lateran Council of 1123.”
Why do you think we need compulsory clerical celibacy? Where IS such a requirement found in the Bible? What IS wrong with the idea of married priests? We have a number of married priests in my own archdiocese. And they do just fine, it doesn’t bother me in the least.