The Vatican’s new secretary of state has said that
priestly celibacy is not church dogma and therefore open to discussion, marking a significant change in approach towards one of the thorniest issues facing the Roman Catholic Church.
"Celibacy is not an institution but look, it is also true that you can discuss (it) because as you say this is not a dogma, a dogma of the church," Archbishop Pietro Parolin said in response to a question during an interview with Venezuelan newspaper El Universal.
He added that while it was not dogma, clerical celibacy was a deeply entrenched Catholic tradition.
29 comments:
First blue jeans and now this.
I haven't noticed that this issue is particularly "thorny," or of any interest to Catholics.
This issue is, however, of great interest to non-Catholics who, for some reason, think they ought to have some say in Church policy.
Church history shows that Catholic clerical celibacy has ALWAYS been open to discussion (or dismissal) ... just not always within the Vatican.
Sorry to burst any bubbles, but...
Nothing new here.
I think, if you do a search, you'll find almost the exact same comments by some Vatican official happening at some point during the reign of Benedict XVI and John Paul II, and perhaps Paul VI...
Because someone is always asking the question, and this accurate answer is given, and then some dopey journalist thinks s/he's got something.
Pope Francis ain't gonna change the celibacy rule.
Not.
Gonna.
Happen.
I'm presently listening to a lecture series on Christianity.
Apparently, Constantine made Christianity the official state religion and gave them a bunch of government buildings so they had to change a bunch of dogma to accommodate the crowds and keep them entertained.
The lecturer talks about sanctifying time and space which sounds a bit too much like physics for my taste.
He has yet to use the word "theater" but he doesn't have to, not for me, anyway.
I should add that he kind of sounds like a homo.
I agree that this Pope is what the Catholic Church needed. Not all will agree. I remind folks of the great Lincoln quote about pleasing people.
So what is your take Father Martin?
Should the church drop celibacy, at some point in the future maybe?
Make it voluntary?
(1) I knew a guy in high school who was into boxing.
He said that part of the preparation for a fight is abstaining from sex and blaming it on your opponent.
I believed him, for the most part. Maybe he just lifted it from Raging Bull (1980).
(2) A quick internet search tells me there aren't a whole lot of Protestant monasteries out there. It would be rash to conclude that's because they're all circulating with the general public trying to get laid same as the rest of us.
I should hasten to add that Trappist beer is a beautiful thing.
I agree with FMF, I have heard this answer for years.
I could see the church maybe adopting the Orthodox rule (it allows Parish priests to marry, requires celibacy for bishop and higher). But that issue will be debated for a while (maybe a 100 years or so). But you never know, if they start running out of priests they could do that and essentially allow Deacons to say mass on their own.
Lem, make it voluntary?
As opposed to the Church demanding that priests go out and get married? Part of the vow of obedience?
That is more Unification Church.
I think voluntary is a given.
I like this Pope because he just answers what he thinks. He wants to reach out to secular Westerners with talk about redemption of people of conscious.
So far I do not see him big reformer like John XXIII (but that remains to be seen), but as a more approachable figure. A quality John Paul II had but Benedict definitely did not.
How much of these new Pope kerfluffles are due to translation errors?
It's really hard to understand nuances if you aren't versed in the speaker's original language.
If you go long enough without ejaculating, you take a piss and then semen leaks out afterwards.
It feels like a mini-orgasm.
Not all of the semen comes out and so you have to work your dick like a cow's udder to get it all out. You have to do it fast or you'll get a boner. The toilet paper's right there so that's not a problem.
I speak from personal experience.
Extreme Unction used to be an important sacrament. Priests would hurry to the hospital to administer the Last Rites. Not so much any more. This change happened in my lifetime......The Church is resistant to change, but it undeniably does change. I think the Holy Fathers should bring back Interdiction. No more sacraments for Massachusetts until they remove Elizabeth Warren from office.
Celibacy is not the same as marriage. Those arguing for and end to priestly celibacy sometimes are looking for gay priests to have their sexual encounters legitimized. Won't happen.
There already is a pathway for priestly marriage. A married Anglican priest can enter a Catholic seminary and become an ordained Catholic priest while married.
Never understood why people care about this. Our associate pastor mentioned it during a homily recently and basically said, "if the priests aren't complaining, why should anyone else?"
He also made some humorous remarks similar to what a lot of married guys would say about polygamy- kind of the priests version of "I'd have to be nuts to want another wife."
My mom, a sort of disgruntled Catholic, sometimes says that she thinks priests should be able to marry. She thinks they'd be more attuned to the realities of marriage and its difficulties. I think just the opposite. An unmarried priest has a unique perspective, hearing the problems from husbands and wives, while maintaining a perspective on the ideal of the sacramental union. If he was a husband to someone, he'd be in the trenches and unable to see the other side of things.
Michael Haz is exactly right. There are cases where a married man has become a Catholic priest. They even waived the rules for some real tough assignments back in the day.
It is exactly right to say that celibacy is the issue not marriage.
There is a shortage of priests but it will be made up the young and vigorous church in Africa and Asia where the Faith is still strong and vibrant.
About this "celibacy is the issue not marriage" idea --
Celibacy is, by definition, the state of being unmarried.
Meanwhile, as has already been pointed out, the only people that are interested in the matter of promoting a married priesthood are non-Catholics and those who like to dissent from the Church. Certainly those men who are priests or are in the seminary are uniformly strongly in favor of priestly celibacy, not only for the practical reasons which are largely the foundation of it being a discipline, but also because beyond it being "just a discipline," beyond it being a lost-standing tradition of many, many centuries, there are good, if not compelling, theological reasons for priestly celibacy. To be sure, even in the Eastern Church, where priests can be married, bishops (who possess the fullness of Holy Orders, while priests do not) must be celibate, i.e. unmarried. That theology recognizes that Jesus did not have a human wife, but instead is a Bridegroom espoused to the Church as His Holy Bride. Likewise, priests, being an alter Christus because of the Sacrament of Holy Orders, are in a sense married to the Church. In the same way, women religious (nuns) consider themselves to be the brides of Christ.
Priests would hurry to the hospital to administer the Last Rites.
Back in those days it made sense for priests to be celibate.
They could do all sorts of things without ever missing their daughters' piano recitals.
Lem:
You asked for my take. I can write a lot on this, dealing with misunderstandings of the issue. Here goes...
1. It's already voluntary; being a priest is voluntary. (I know that's not what you meant, but you get my point.)
2. Ending the rule on celibacy doesn't mean priests can marry. Yes, you read that right. Now re-read that again, before moving to point 3...
3. Ending the rule on celibacy means that married men can become priests; that's different. The Church will never change the rules so that a man who is ordained can, subsequently, get married. As it stands now, if a deacon's wife dies, he can't marry again.
4. The people who talk about this say they want to encourage vocations, or make things easier for priests.
They may believe that, but they are badly mistaken.
Consider: we don't have to hypothesize about this. The Catholic Church already has married clergy: they're called deacons. Anyone who wants to know what it'll be like to have married priests, can learn a lot from how things are for married deacons.
Now, our deacons are great; but being married complicates things. They usually have to wait to enter theology training, because of children. They can't give fulltime, because of family commitments.
You don't need me to explain it, it's obvious. That's why Saint Paul recommended celibacy for the kingdom--following Christ's own words. People think the Medieval Church thought this up. No, it was Jesus Christ's idea. Doesn't anyone read the Gospels? Apparently not.
5. Basically, ending the celibacy rule just replaces one set of problems with another.
6. One more point. The people who get all excited on this subject seldom, if ever, stop to consider how the bishops and the pope will think about this.
One of the considerations a pope will have, in weighing this, is the historical context; does he really want to set aside a venerable tradition going back to the New Testament in origin, and in practice, going back nearly as far?
And then there are the practical considerations. To show how unserious this talk is: can anyone point to an attempt to work out the financial implications of such a change? How it would affect seminary training and parish budgets? If you find such a study, please let me know. I'm betting none exists.
By comparison, the Church "recently" underwent a process of revising the English translation of the Mass. I say recently. It was completed in 2011. It began in the 1980s. The financial impact of that, on parishes, was buying new books. A pain, but bearable. For that they took 30 years.
Then there is the ecumenical considerations. Most people talking about this haven't a clue on this one, but this a HUGE issue for the Vatican.
Specifically, how would the Orthodox look at this? Now I know what you're thinking: the Orthodox don't mandate priestly celibacy. True; but they respect this about the West. For all the complaints about Romans, from Orthodox, this is one of the things the Orthodox respect.
They felt the same about our liturgy--so what did we Romans do? Jettison the venerable Mass. Very bad for ecumenism.
This would be too. And while the pope's advisors 40 years ago didn't consider this, vis-a-vis the Mass, I think they will, this time. Burnt fingers, and all that.
Ending the celibacy requirement is not a serious proposal. But: the question asked was, can it change? Can we talk about it? And the answers are yes.
The Church could also tear down and rebuild Saint Peter's Basilica too. Feel free to discuss that all you want as well.
Dibs on the Michaealangelo and Berninis!
I just want the union contracts and no show jobs for the rebuilding project.
If you go long enough without ejaculating, you take a piss and then semen leaks out afterwards.
This sounds absolutely dreadful.
Gotta say this whole discussion, especially the ecumenicism stuff, makes me happy I was born to Protestants. I so want to put in a Monty Python link here, but I won't. Not this time.
I think allowing priests to marry is the only way to save the church. Years ago families had so many kids they didn't care if one son chose the priesthood. In fact, they were proud of it. Now small families don't want to give up their only son or child to the church so allowing priests to marry will expand the pool of potential priests.
ST- for once, think before you pop off.
I totally disagree. The church will get it's priests from where it is still strong and vibrant and people still have faith. It used to be Ireland and Italy and Poland. Now it is Africa and Asia.
If we can not maintain the faith the way it should be maintained then we deserve what we get.
AJ:
As I mentioned above, the Church has *never* allowed priests to marry.
Never.
As in...never.
Not the Orthodox, or any Church with the priesthood.
They allow men to marry before ordination. That's not a semantical difference. If the celibacy rule disappeared tomorrow, I could still never marry; and if a married man of, say 25 is ordained, he can't ever remarry if his wife dies.
And, of course, what 25- or 30-year old with a family is going to enter the seminary?
If you get more priests, they'll be in their 50s and 60s, after their children grow up. This is not speculation; it's what happens now with deacons.
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