Ecumenical Patriarchate to Allow Second Marriage for Greek Orthodox Priests

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Genesis315

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The Holy Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate has decided to allow a second marriage for Greek Orthodox priests in the event that they are widowed or abandoned by their wife, religious news website Romfea.gr says.
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I found this interesting in that I had always assumed that the EOs believed the same as Catholics, that while a married man may be ordained a priest, a priest cannot marry (a quick google showed many EO sites agreeing that this is the case).

Is this move precedented or justified in the EO world?
 
It just goes to show that the polemic we so often hear from certain Orthodox on the internet that Orthodoxy is unchanging while Catholicism introduces novelties is not quite true…
This is an example of a very “progressive” novelty. I’m not saying it’s wrong… that’s not for me to say. But it is a novelty.
 
There are not only Orthodox, but at least one Eastern Catholic case in which a priest with small children was allowed to marry–but these cases are about the children and their needs, not the priest himself (which is what this new policy seems to be about).

hawk
 
Yes, the idea of a priest in active ministry dating just seems so odd…
 
I’ve always assumed that the small children involved a woman stepping forward on behalf of the children, but I have no basis at all for that . . .

hawk
 
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I meant more the situation envisioned in this new GO provision.
 
To me it looks like a slippery slope. They allow it in cases of priests"abandoned" by their wives.

I can think of a few different scenarios here, all of which might be rationalized under the Abandon label.
 
In general, “abandonment” is the grounds under which an Orthodox is permitted to marry again after divorce. The various specifics under which it is allowed are classified as being types of abandonment.

hawk
 
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