Are Wives A Burden?

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Some who argue against a married priesthood view a wife and family as a burden. I think most men consider their wives and families as assets. How are priests different?

The wife of a former Episcopalian who was ordained a Catholic priest had this to say about their 50 year marriage, “…being with him, helping him fulfill his role and making it possible for him to do what the Lord has asked him to do have been my way of serving the Lord.”
 
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gksaoh:
Some who argue against a married priesthood view a wife and family as a burden. I think most men consider their wives and families as assets. How are priests different?

The wife of a former Episcopalian who was ordained a Catholic priest had this to say about their 50 year marriage, “…being with him, helping him fulfill his role and making it possible for him to do what the Lord has asked him to do have been my way of serving the Lord.”
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Burden is not the right word. But a priest must be able to spend time with their family, which takes time away from their ability to fully commit themselves to their parishes. Priests are extremely busy, especially those who not only have a normal parish but those who are associated with universities. Our priest has finally gotten someone to help him. He has a parish of a thousand or so families and a state university.
 
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yochumjy:
Burden is not the right word. But a priest must be able to spend time with their family, which takes time away from their ability to fully commit themselves to their parishes. Priests are extremely busy, especially those who not only have a normal parish but those who are associated with universities. Our priest has finally gotten someone to help him. He has a parish of a thousand or so families and a state university.
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Right. Wives are indeed a great blessing. But marriage is a vocation and like all vocations it takes lots of dedicated work. Priests are already busier than one-armed paper hangers–adding a wife would be overload.

Scott
 
I agree with everybody above in that a priest has a wife. It is the Church. His children are those he pastors. That is a LOT of work in and of itself. He most likely probably won’t want any more responsibilites if he is doing his pastoral and clerical duties well!

(but then again, I am a girl and may be a bit biased that we aren’t too terrible!)
 
No wives are not a burden. They are a priority. And so is the priesthood.

ANY other career a man can choose would take a lower precedence to his duties to his wife. If the career gets in between - the career must go, simple as that.

It just is not so simple when dealing with the priesthood. The Roman Rite’s stance on a cellebate priesthood honors both the priesthood and marriage. Because both are so revered in the Catholic Church that She can’t say which is more important. Because She can’t say which is more important, She considers it wise to avoid being put in the situation where one must choose.

She also knows that a person does not need to be both priest and husband in order to be fulfilled in life.
 
Black Jaque:
No wives are not a burden. They are a priority. And so is the priesthood.

ANY other career a man can choose would take a lower precedence to his duties to his wife. If the career gets in between - the career must go, simple as that.

It just is not so simple when dealing with the priesthood. The Roman Rite’s stance on a cellebate priesthood honors both the priesthood and marriage. Because both are so revered in the Catholic Church that She can’t say which is more important. Because She can’t say which is more important, She considers it wise to avoid being put in the situation where one must choose.

She also knows that a person does not need to be both priest and husband in order to be fulfilled in life.
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Couldn’t have said it better myself!
 
Priests are married to Holy Mother Church.

How would having a human wife be appropriate? Two wives is one wife too many. 🙂
 
Princess Abby,

Are you aware that the Catholic church has thousands of married priests? Most belong to one of the eastern rites, but there are a few in the Roman rite including some who work in American diocese. They were married Protestant clergy who converted to Catholicism and have been ordained Catholic priests. They are not looked upon a bigamists.

Are you also aware that St. Peter, the first pope, had a wife? If you read scripture, you will find the story of Jesus curing the mother-in-law of St. Peter.
 
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gksaoh:
Princess Abby,

Are you aware that the Catholic church has thousands of married priests? Most belong to one of the eastern rites, but there are a few in the Roman rite including some who work in American diocese. They were married Protestant clergy who converted to Catholicism and have been ordained Catholic priests. They are not looked upon a bigamists.

Are you also aware that St. Peter, the first pope, had a wife? If you read scripture, you will find the story of Jesus curing the mother-in-law of St. Peter.
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Hi. Yes, I’m aware, and yes I read scripture. I assumed you were speaking about the Roman rite, since you did not specifiy. The Eastern rite is different in some practice and in some tradition.

Yes, all the apostles were married, so yes, I’m aware that Peter had a mother-in-law. The tradition of celibacy did not get put into practice until about 900 years ago, I think?

As for the protestant clergy, I assume you are specifying married, Episcopalian priests who when they convert are given a choice to pursue Catholic priesthood. This is only available to them, having to do with the original break in the line of Peter, I think, and not just any breakoff denomination.

Married priesthood is the exception rather than the rule, and only permissible within certain rites. A priest is dedicated to serving the Church in the way a husband would love his wife. Jesus was our first priest, and husbands are commanded to love their wives in the way that Jesus loves the Church.

The family is considered a domestic church, with the husband/father in the role of the priest and the wife the altar…

Our vocation is our means to sanctification. A wife’s duty is to guard her husband’s soul and help him get to heaven; the same goes for the reverse. God gives us a spouse not just for fun, but because He believes we have a better chance of getting to heaven with this person by our side, praying for us and guarding us to the best of their ability. A priest, through his vocation to the Church, is sanctified through his ministry.
 
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gksaoh:
I am weird, I admit it, I aways read profiles. I noticed that you were born in 1913, gksaoh. Well, it is nice to have someone over 90 on these boards.🙂

I used to be Protestant, Independent Baptist to be exact, all pastor wife’s that I knew, expected that their hubby’s would put the church before them. I will give these women credit, many were self sacrificing christians who believed that God should come before their own happiness.

But…it doesn’t have to be that way. In fact, it shouldn’t be that way. Marriage is every bit as important a sacrament as the priesthood, that is why we don’t combine them.
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gksaoh:

I couldn’t help but notice your nickname.

It is identical to that of someone known for rotating through a list of leading or baited questions designed to encourage dissent on the various conservative Catholic forums on Delphi (e.g. CatholicsSource) as well as being a favored member of the often troubled “prod/Catholicism” forum on Delphi.

I also couldn’t avoid noting the similarity of this question and your most recent response to an approach used in the past by that very same poster.

google.com/search?hl=en&q=gksaoh
 
Dang, Ray, you’re good. Are you a detective or something IRL?

Anyway, I’ll answer the question although the OP might well be a troll. A couple of my sisters have left the RCC and become Lutheran. They belong to the same church and have lost their pastors a couple of times and so have been involved in the whole interview process for new pastors. It’s been interesting for me to hear about this. Of course their pastors are married, and marriage hopefully brings children, so there’s this huge extra consideration about the whole process. The pastors question the quality of the school district, the neighborhood, the salary, of course, the benefit package, the perimeters of their duties, whether they would have an assistant pastor, etc – in other words, it’s very much like anyone else applying for a job. Meanwhile, I’m on parish council and our meeting is at 7:00pm and ends at 9:00 pm and our pastor is meeting a family over at the rectory to plan a funeral after our meeting and came from meeting a parishoner in crisis before the meeting … you get the picture. If he had a wife and children they would be horribly neglected by him.

Protestant ministers and Catholic priests are apples and oranges.
 
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dwc:
Protestant ministers and Catholic priests are apples and oranges.
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:yup: their responsibilites, therefore their life-style options, very greatly
 
Are wives a burden? Well they are a blessing, which very much so makes them a burden. NO Cross, NO Glory.

Being a married priest or being a celabant priest both have different good and positive affects.
 
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dwc:
Dang, Ray, you’re good. Are you a detective or something IRL?
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Nope, RL job is a data analyst for a prison school system. Though I’ve been around Internet discussion groups long enough to have a pretty good nose when sniffing out a troll, this particular case is more like where a cop on a beat spots a miscreant up to the same trouble he’s been collared for many times before, but just in a different neighborhood. Gksaoh and I have gone round the bush a few times.
 
I think marriage should be avoided altogethor unless you really can’t help it.

That is just my opinion. My marriage is not doing so hot, and most everyone else I know is or will shortly be divorced. The older I get, the harder it is to repress the pessimism.
 
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gksaoh:
Princess Abby,

Are you aware that the Catholic church has thousands of married priests? Most belong to one of the eastern rites, but there are a few in the Roman rite including some who work in American diocese. They were married Protestant clergy who converted to Catholicism and have been ordained Catholic priests. They are not looked upon a bigamists.

Are you also aware that St. Peter, the first pope, had a wife? If you read scripture, you will find the story of Jesus curing the mother-in-law of St. Peter.
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Yeah, that’s a great idea! Let’s also go back and crucify the christians and feed them to the lions. Let’s require all sinners to practice public penance, and forbid them from receiving the sacraments for years at a time. Let’s go back to the time when men and women were separated during worship, and where women weren’t allowed to exercise any function in the Church.

Antiquarianists such as yourself like to pick and choose things from the past, but it’s exactly that type of behavior that ruined much of our liturgical life since Vatican II.
 
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gksaoh:
Princess Abby,

Are you aware that the Catholic church has thousands of married priests? Most belong to one of the eastern rites, but there are a few in the Roman rite including some who work in American diocese. They were married Protestant clergy who converted to Catholicism and have been ordained Catholic priests. They are not looked upon a bigamists.
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Those are valid points but you are comparing apples to oranges. In the Eastern rites, for example, the parishes tend to be much smaller and daily Mass is not a regular occuarance.

The Church has allowed some converts who were married clergy to be ordained in the RCC as well. This is done on an experimental, case-by-case basis. Even when approved, those priests are rarely (if ever) assigned to a parish. They serve the Church in other roles such as diocisan work, teaching or prison ministry.

Wives are not a burden, they can be invaluable helpmates. However, raising a family while serving as a parish priest seems like it would be adding burdens and responsibilities for already overburdened priests.
 
I think marriage should be avoided altogethor unless you really can’t help it.
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That is just my opinion. My marriage is not doing so hot, and most everyone else I know is or will shortly be divorced. The older I get, the harder it is to repress the pessimism.
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Egads! That is pessimistic.

Sounds like you need to get to know some other people, just so you don’t convince yourself that divorce is normal.
 
Classic trolling post!

Wives aren’t a BURDEN. But orders ARE a vocation, not just a job. You don’t go home after work!

Even in the eastern rites, the married priests aren’t what you may think. They cannot become bishops. They cannot be ordered priests. They don’t go to the mission field.

Celibate priesthood frees priests to give themselves fully to the church, to be prophets, and -as is often necessary for prophets- martyrs.
 
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