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Regson2054
Guest
Our diocesan Priest has often stated that he did not take a vow of celibacy when he was ordained and is not called to a life of celibacy. Is this an accurate statement?
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Tantum_ergo
Guest
Actually, I believe that diocesan priests do not take a vow of POVERTY.
Let’s check this out.
Aha, here we are.
So, he had better be celibate, or risk breaking a solemn promise. . .which would be a mortal sin.
Let’s check this out.
Aha, here we are.
So perhaps you misunderstood your priest. While he made no formal vow (as RELIGIOUS, opposed to diocesan priests) do, he DID make solemn promises of CELIBACY and of OBEDIENCE, but not of poverty.
So, he had better be celibate, or risk breaking a solemn promise. . .which would be a mortal sin.
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m134e5
Guest
“Solemn Promise”? “Vow”? Honestly, what’s the difference? Really- there isn’t any. Let’s not split hairs here.
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m134e5
Guest
He is married to the Church. He was not married to anybody else when he was ordained. The specifics of his ordination- vows or solemn promises (if there are any differences) are irrelevent. It is a mortal sin to break his vow- or “solemn promise”- of celibacy.
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Pius_X
Guest
m134e5 said:
Vows are made direectly to God. Promises are made to the Bishop (and through the Bishop, to God).
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Psalm45_9
Guest
Diocesan priest only promise to be obedient to the bishop and his successors. Diocesans do not take a vow of poverty, they recieve a salary. They do not vow chastity, they live it out of obedience to their bishop who says it is necessary according to his superior, the Pope. If a diocesan priest wants to personally take these vows he can.
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Br.Rich_SFO
Guest
That could be correct. He may have taken a vow of Chastity for his state in life, single. Which is in effect a vow of celibacy.
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kleary
Guest
Your diocesean priest is wrong. He made a PROMISE of CELIBACY and OBEDIENCE to his BISHOP so he is bound to obedience and to celibacy. If he was not “called to a life of celibacy” he should never have been ordained a priest because Roman Catholic priests must promise to be celibate.
This priest of yours is trying to confuse you with religious priests who take three vows before God- Poverty, Chastity and Obedience. Diocesean priests do not take vows.
Ken
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cameron_lansing
Guest
While he did not take a vow, he is obliged to celibacy and to protect it, and did make a promise. This sort of talk always makes me uncomfortable, as though it implies rejection of celibacy or is setting us up for a departure from the clerical state. It could be a benign comment though, and I would have to give the benefit of the doubt.
Otherwise, I would agree with
m134e5 said:
The practical effect will obviously be the same. The hairs are not to be split over that point.
I would want to ask then, what does the Church wish to tell us by using different words? Why might it want to make a distinction? What point would rest behind that? Just some references…
“A vow is a deliberate and free promise made to God concerning a possible and better good which must be fulfilled by reason of the virtue of religion” (c 1191 §1). PiusX mentioned this. As a way of life, this celibacy — along with poverty and obedience — is intrinsic to the nature of consecrated life since they are the evangelical counsels themselves (c. 537). We cannot detach any of them from the very nature of consecrated life in a religious institute. The legitimate acceptance of such vows results in changing the legal and moral status of the person in the Church. The person becomes a member of a religious institute, and assumes rights and duties from the vow.
By contrast, celibacy, obedience and poverty are not intrinsic to the nature of Holy Orders as they are in the case of the consecrated life. That is “conferred by an imposition of hands and by the consecratory prayer which the liturgical books prescribe for the individual grades” (c. 1009).
“Non religious” priests and married deacons who devote completely themselves to ecclesiastical ministry are not bound to poverty since they have a right to remuneration (c. 281). We also know that celibacy is of a disciplinary nature and not attached to the very nature of diaconate or priesthood, since the Church ordains the married in most of the Catholic Churches of the East as well as married men to diaconate, and under the Pastoral Provision, may ordain married men to the priesthood…
Similarly, obedience is not of the very nature of diaconate or priesthood themselves. However, it is necessary for the common good, good order, and the hierarchical communion of the Church. This is because the Catholic Church is “governed by the successor of Peter and the bishops in communion with him” (c. 204 §2).
As a result, we have two canons which expressly describe celibacy and obedience as “obligations.” For those ordained as unmarried candidates for the permanent diaconate or as candidates for the presbyterate, if they are not in a religious institute, celibacy is an obligation which they must assume publicly before God and the Church before ordination (c. 1037). Further, clerics are bound by a special obligation to show reverence and obedience to the Supreme Pontiff and to their own ordinary (c. Canon 237). The act of promising these obligations does not make a person a deacon or priest, but the Church will not ordain a man unless he makes that promise.
So here are the relevant questions asked by the ordaining bishop: “Do you promise respect and obedience to me and my successors?” and “In the presence of God and the Church, are you resolved, as a sign of your interior dedication to Christ, to remain celibate for the sake of the kingdom and in lifelong service to God and mankind?”
The latter would suggest the nature of a promise to God as well as the Church.
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viktor_aleksndr
Guest
Diocesan priests takes a vow before the God and the people on CHASTITY and OBEDIENCE. Chastity meaning living a celibate life.
Religious take a vow of POVERTY, CHASTITY, and OBEDIENCE.
Religious take a vow of POVERTY, CHASTITY, and OBEDIENCE.
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CatholicCid
Guest
If I remember correctly, chastity for Priests is not an infallible teaching, so he might be refering to the smallest possibility of it changing and his support of it… If this is the case, of course he should not bank on it
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Deacon_Ed
Guest
While it is true that celibacy is a discipline and not a dogmatic or doctrinal teaching, once one is ordained marriage is no longer possible (there are some exceptions for permanent deacons, but those are very hard to get). In general, marriage is not an impediment to orders, but orders is an impediment to marriage.
Deacon Ed
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CatholicCid
Guest
Deacon Ed:
What about the Priest who become laicized (sp?) to get married (and stop becoming Priests)?
Sorry for the questions, but am somewhat confused as to why the Promise to the Church must be kept even if the Church itself issues the change.
So, even if the teacher were to change for some reason, the currently ordained could not become married?
What about the Priest who become laicized (sp?) to get married (and stop becoming Priests)?
Sorry for the questions, but am somewhat confused as to why the Promise to the Church must be kept even if the Church itself issues the change.
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G_S
Guest
Depending upon his age, your diocesan priest took his vow of celibacy either just before becoming a subdeacon or just prior to being ordained as a deacon. Two men were ordained as transitional deacons at my own diaconal ordination and made their promise of celibacy just before we all made our promise of obedience. A couple of days prior to ordination, we made a very solemn vow which is not repeated at the ordination itself. To spilt hairs, we could say that he didn’t make a vow of celibacy just before his priestly ordination.
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mosher
Guest
It is not about the promise. The ontological effect that takes place after receiving Holy Orders makes a person unable to receive Sacrmental Marriage. This is why married clergy must be married before the receive Deacon.
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mikew262
Guest
Deacon Ed:
I have heard in rare cases, a priest converted from the Anglican Church, who was married, and later became a Catholic priest was allowed to stay married.
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mosher
Guest
Right, but as an Anglican he was not a priest so it is not a problem. Sometimes it scandalizes Catholic who don’t understand the rules about priests and marriage (usually it is a problem they have with thinking that there is something wrong with sexual relations) but it is not in violation of our understanding of the Sacraments.
A minor note. While not causing an ontological change another thing that causes a person to not be disposed to receive the sacrament of matrimony is reception of Solemn Vows in a Pontifical Order.
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gelsbern
Guest
Don’t know if you know or not, but you cannot make sweeping statments in regards to many groups who are similar to catholics. Lutherans, Anglicanc, Episcopalians, Old Catholic and quite a few others have ex-Roman Catholic bishops among their ranks who do indeed ordain and those ordinations are indeed valid. So it is hightly possible that an Anglican priest was indeed a true priest, even though he was married. The Eastern churches have married clergy and that does not make them less than true priests.
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mosher
Guest
Leo XIII declared that all Anglican orders were invalid due to a defect in the consecratory rite itself. Lutherans are one step further away than Anglicans in ordination intention. Even if a validly ordained Bishop uses the consecratory rite of the Anglicans or Lutherans it still has no effect on the person being “ordained.”
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cameron_lansing
Guest
The ontological configuration to Christ is separable from the ecclesiastical law of celibacy. This is just too well documented to be denied. As I asserted above, celibacy, obedience and poverty are not intrinsic to the nature of Holy Orders as they are in the case of the consecrated life.
- Otherwise there would be no need for the diriment impediment of canon 1087 which says “Those in sacred orders invalidly attempt marriage.” The legislator does not make laws unless there is a reason for them.
- Nor would there be need of a candidate to assume the obligation prior to ordination to the diaconate as canon 1037 requires of the unmarried. The legislator would not have imposed this requirement if the ontological change of ordination sufficed to make the ordained unable to marry.
- Nor would the Apostolic See permit widowed deacons, as it has on occasion, to enter another marriage. It could not do this if the ontological change could not be separated from the capacity to marry.
Moreover, when someone loses the clerical state (validly received), the ontological character of orders continues. Not even loss of the clerical state can remove it.
Can. 290 says “Once validly received, sacred ordination never becomes invalid. A cleric, nevertheless, loses the clerical state: 1ºby a judicial sentence or administrative decree, which declares the invalidity of sacred ordination; 2º by a penalty of dismissal legitimately imposed; 3º by rescript of the Apostolic See which grants it to deacons only for grave causes and to presbyters only for most grave causes.” (Note, the intra text version incorrectly repeats number 1 again as number 2.)
Can. 291 says “Apart from the case mentioned in can. 290, n. 1, loss of the clerical state does not entail a dispensation from the obligation of celibacy, which only the Roman Pontiff grants.” If the ordination were invalid, no obligation assumed prior to it would be binding. But the Roman Pontiff can dispense from the obligation of celibacy in numbers 2 and 3, and does, even though the ontological change endures.
Now those bound by a public and perpetual vow of chastity in a religious institute would also invalidly attempt marriage (canon 1088). (However, it is not required that this be an institute of pontifical right. Such a vow even in an institute of diocesan right invalidates. Mosher, you may be thinking of canon 1078 §2, 1º which makes the dispensation reserved to the Apostolic See when it is a case of membership in a religious institute of pontifical right.)
An indult of departure entails dispensation from the evangelical vows, including perpetual chastity (canon 692) since those are intrinsic to institutes of consecrated life (canon 573 §2). A rescript of dismissal is similar in its effect regarding vows (canon 701).
Blessed Lent and Easter to all!
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