Can catholic priest be married?

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katarinaclaire

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can someone who join priesthood be married and have children? since corona, we all have been attend online mass and I want to explore the world catholic online mass. Today, when I attend the online mass, I am shocked when the priest said he is married and already have a children… I thought it is forbiden and only protestant’ pastor who able to get married… before i got baptised which is 1 year ago, my teacher said priest cannot be married… is there any changes in the teaching or what?
 
But at the mass he said “the pandemic make my wife and 3 children unable to attend the mass”. So, for a second I thought this is not a catholic mass.
 
katarinaclaire said:
can someone who join priesthood be married and have children?
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Some married men can become priests.
Priests cannot marry after ordination.

Currently married men who can become priests are limited to Eastern Catholics and some married converts from Anglicanism and Lutheranism. Canon Law of the Latin Church does not currently allow married priests.

This is a discipline not a doctrine.
 
Are you sure this was the priest and not the deacon? It is quite common for married men to be ordained to the diaconate.
 
Two priests I personally know where married (wife died) and both have kids (who are now adults). Irregular but does happen.
 
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I also know two who were married, have kids, were divorced and annulled, and then ordained.
 
I’ve met married Latin Catholic priests with families who were Anglican Ordinariate and convert from Lutheran. In both cases their wives and any young children converted also.
Also Eastern Catholic priests can marry.
 
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This is only true in the Latin Church. Someone born and raised Catholic, can, in fact, be married after he has been ordained a priest in the east, but not afterwards.
 
Not quite. They have to be married before they’re ordained.
 
Blessed here to have two married priests. Both were converts from Anglicanism, married with children (and now grandchildren).

These men are converts.
 
katarinaclaire said:
But at the mass he said “the pandemic make my wife and 3 children unable to attend the mass”.
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Either he was clergy in a church whose converts can be ordained (e.g., episcopal, lutheran, methodist), or a bi-ritual Eastern Catholic priest helping out the latin parish (or an ordinariate priest, for that matter)
 
Married men can become priests.

Often married men who are received into the Catholic Church and who were a minister in say the Anglican/Episcopalian Church before they entered the Catholic Church are allowed to be ordained.

Of course, in the Eastern Catholic churches it is the norm for priests to be married.

It is important to note that married men can be ordained. Once ordained clergy cannot marry. So, if a single man is ordained he would not be able to marry. If a married man was ordained and later widowed he would not be allowed to marry again.

Married men are first ordained deacon and then priest. Married men cannot be ordained as bishops. In the Eastern churches where married priests are the norm bishops are frequently chosen from monasteries as they are the principal source of unmarried priests.

Celibacy and the priesthood is what is called a discipline. It is not a matter of doctrine.
 
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