Get Rid of the Celibacy Requirement

[KJW5551]

Same tired arguments. Let’s take them one by one.

What about priests whose wives divorce them or priests who seek a divorce?

Couples who practice NFP (which the priests and his wife should be doing) divorce at amazingly low rates. Something like 5%. Yes, there is the possibility of divorce causing scandal, but I doubt it’d be very frequent at all.

And who will pay for the housing, etc., of all the wives and children? Most Catholic families are already overextended.

We’ve already discussed this. Many rectories would need to remodeled to make them fit for a family. Others are so empty that they could easily house a family or two tomorrow. And housing for priests is free. And we could make K-12 Catholic education for their children free. Those are enormous household costs that a priest and his family would not need to worry about.

What about the stress put on the children of priests to be “holier than thou?”

They would not feel pressure to be “holier than thou”; they’d be encouraged to set good examples of Christian behavior for their friends and classmates. Yes, they’d be “under the spotlight” more than you or me, but aren’t we all called to be holy?

 

[ConstantLearner]

It’s a little naive, in my opinion, to think NFP lowers the divorce rate, if that’s what you’re saying. I think couples who practice NFP are already inclined to preserve their marriage, Not all priests would marry a woman so inclined. One can see that by looking at who many of them marry when they do leave the priesthood.

I also think your solution to the housing problem is a little simplistic. Families don’t want to live in a communal rectory, they want their own home. Most large rectories are divided into one large kitchen, a dining area, a living area, and several small bedrooms with small sitting rooms and bath for priests. And not all parishes have large rectories capable of being remodeled. Most married couples feel stress or squabble when the aged mother or father of one comes to live with them. It would be pandemonium for unrelated families to be living together under the same roof. One family might think the other’s children aren’t well behaved. Another would complain that a family stays up too late or doesn’t share the kitchen. All kinds of problems erupt when families attempt to live together. And even if the housing problem could be solved that way, who is going ro pay for their insurance, food, electricity, telephone, Internet, water, etc. How is the priest going to afford vacations for four or five or six, etc.? It should be his responsibility, not the parishioners.

Children of Protestant ministers have been feeling pressured unduly for some time now. It would probably be worse with children of priests, but that’s a small problem when compared with the enormous cost of providing for the daily needs of many “priest families.”

One poster has already posted the statistics that most child abuse happens in families. Throwing families together and increasing their stress levels isn’t the way to end abuse. Celibacy is not the problem.

The answer is to properly prepare seminarians for the challenges they will face once they are ordained. As someone who has lectured at seminaries (I was never a professor on staff), I can attest to the fact that young seminarians are not properly prepared.

 

[ConstantLearner]

You are increasing quantity but not quality.

If you mean me, I want to do the opposite: properly prepare seminarians and implement lay watchdog committees.

 

[ConstantLearner]

Fr. So and So will still have touched Sally, you won’t have prevented it, we’ll get the same media circus

Worse, if the priest is married.

 

[gcshapero]

Celibacy is not what caused this crisis. There may be a few reasons for it, but celibacy is not one of them.

That said, I can see how isolation could. I was listening to Trent Horn’s podcast and he talked about this and proposed priests regularly live in a community house with other religious.

Many already do, but many also don’t and this family environment with regular routine would be very helpful and remove the sense of isolation that many priests experience.

Chastity isn’t what did this though.

 

[pnewton]

Unless there was an ulterior motive for demanding a celibate priesthood. The Catholic Church mandated celibacy mainly for selfish reasons…Why does God seem to bless Protestantism? …The laity has no power in their own church!

I am tired of anti-Catholic porcine detergent. What you are posting is slanderous and untrue. The Church will not become this image of the world. The same St. Paul that taught in Sacred Scripture that it is better to be celibate, also taught us that we must not be conformed to the world. The Protestant model, which has only existed since the last third of the Christian era, and is based in the same humanism that has gutted Europe, is not the one to follow.

The Church does not belong to the laity, as you suggest, but as always, to Jesus Christ. She is His bride, not your social club.

 

[goout]

Celibacy is not what caused this crisis. There may be a few reasons for it, but celibacy is not one of them.

That said, I can see how isolation could. I was listening to Trent Horn’s podcast and he talked about this and proposed priests regularly live in a community house with other religious.

Many already do, but many also don’t and this family environment with regular routine would be very helpful and remove the sense of isolation that many priests experience.

Chastity isn’t what did this though.

Chastity is not the same thing as celibacy. All people are called to chastity, including married people. Chastity is well integrated sexuality, whether one is celibate or married.

It’s true that celibacy does not cause abuse. Homosexual desire does not cause abuse. Power does not cause abuse. Neither do secrecy or money. Access to young vulnerable men does not cause abuse.

People choose to abuse.

Culture forms people, and culture promotes the particular values that predominate in that culture. All of the above factors combine to produce the culture that fosters this abuse. Culture is a stew, not a one item thing like a steak.

If you are not willing to at least consider changing the factors in that culture, then it’s hard to be on the side of serious change. Celibacy is one of those factors.

 

[goout]

It’s a little naive, in my opinion, to think NFP lowers the divorce rate, if that’s what you’re saying. I think couples who practice NFP are already inclined to preserve their marriage, Not all priests would marry a woman so inclined. One can see that by looking at who many of them marry when they do leave the priesthood.

Not to get too off topic:
The practice of NFP is a practice of virtue. Several virtues in fact. The practice of virtue leads to…more virtue. And the end of that virtue is peace, joy, faith, love etc…That includes more stable marriages. Stable marriages don’t happen merely through desire. That desire has to take on flesh through a real conformity to Christ.

Men accepting priesthood should be more likely to have stable and virtuous marriages.

 

[ConstantLearner]

Men accepting priesthood should be more likely to have stable and virtuous marriages.

They should be, true, but not all are. I know priests who left the Church to marry and eventually divorced. Some became Anglican priests.

Getting rid of celibacy is a slippery slope to me. Next, the Church will be allowing divorce, then contraception, etc. Eventually, Catholicism will be removed from G-d.

 

[goout]

goout:

Men accepting priesthood should be more likely to have stable and virtuous marriages.

They should be, true, but not all are. I know priests who left the Church to marry and eventually divorced. Some became Anglican priests.

Getting rid of celibacy is a slippery slope to me. Next, the Church will be allowing divorce, then contraception, etc. Eventually, Catholicism will be removed from G-d.

Not all, true. But we have to distinguish between the particular and the general, the exceptional and unusual from the median case. Between perfection and predominant virtue.

We do this all the time. We know that a few brain surgeons show up with alcohol on their breath and still, brain surgeons are usually brilliant.

 

[ConstantLearner]

That’s all true, but I don’t think celibacy is the problem at all for all the reasons given in this thread by me and by others.

We simply disagree here, but that’s fine.

 

[goout]

That’s a;; true, but I don’t think celibacy is the problem at all for all the reasons given in this thread by me and by others.

We simply disagree here, but that’s fine.

I agree, celibacy taken in a vacuum is not the problem. Celibacy for the kingdom of God is a unique blessing like marriage is a unique blessing.

I’ve said numerous times that culture is a stew of all the factors, not a steak. Celibacy is a good.
How do you come to the conclusion that another good thing detracts from the other good thing?
The kingdom of God is abundantly good, and those goods should multiply when they are integrated with one another.
Considering married priests does not threaten the Church.

 

[ConstantLearner]

Considering married priests does not threaten the Church.

I’m sure they have been and will be considered again. What will ultimately happen, I haven’t the vaguest clue.

 

[SeriousQuestion]

We’ve already discussed this. Many rectories would need to remodeled to make them fit for a family. Others are so empty that they could easily house a family or two tomorrow. And housing for priests is free. And we could make K-12 Catholic education for their children free. Those are enormous household costs that a priest and his family would not need to worry about.

That doesn’t work. Didn’t a bunch of posters already mention how the diocese doesn’t pay for these things?

 

[pnewton]

I like it, and agree. It may well be that a culture shift is taking place that will result in a limited role of some married priests, though I do not think the idea painted here of a young deciding both to marry and be a priest is on the radar. I would see more a limited role like the diaconate, older men who are married and serve as priest mainly for Sacramental purposes.

 

[Sarcelle]

Marriage is no guarantee of chastity.

If a man can not contain himself sexually with a woman who he then marries, what makes you so sure that he wouldn’t be able to contain himself with women not his wife?

Adultery does exist after all.

 

[AlNg]

Adultery does exist after all.

Adultery between two consenting adults, man and woman, is wrong of course. But is it as bad as what we are reading in the horrifying reports about Roman Catholic priests raping innocent children?

 

[Sarcelle]

So if you have married priests, there might be the scandal of adultery but if you stick with celibacy there is a risk of child rape?

Is this your point?

There are married pedophiles too you know.

There are two points of view that seem to be floating around on this thread. The first proposes that getting rid of the celibacy requirement will widen the pool of men for the priesthood and therefore increase the chances of getting good priests. Fair enough. That argument has its merits.

Then there is the other assumption which is untrue and frankly offensive. That celibacy causes pedophilia. This casts all single people under suspicion.

 

[kainosktisis]

I don’t think that celibacy is the issue, but rather, chastity as mentioned by another poster.

When I was Protestant, I’d attended at least one church in my past where the assistant pastor had had an affair with one of the church members, & he was married with children. At another, the pastor had divorced & then married a church member. I’d attended at one Nondenominational church that had an assistant pastor who was divorced & remarried. There were incidents that made headlines with names like Jim & Tammy Faye Bakker, Jimmy Swaggart, Ted Haggard, & Googling turns up many reports of abuse in Protestant churches, so this is not unique to the Church. It appears that no church is immune.

There was an article in the news that someone had posted regarding Willow Creek Church, which is dealing with their own scandal in the aftermath of its pastor’s indiscretions, & he was married, but has stepped down.

Marriage does not necessarily prevent such incidents from happening.

 

[JMM1957]

I think we are all talking about fixing something that cannot be fixed. Even though we would like to think that someone going into the seminary is a very good, moral person, the fact is, they are just like everyone else on the planet, sinners. I do believe that the desire to go into the priesthood is special gift, but it doesn’t mean that these people are above doing wrong, even serious wrong once they get in there. I don’t really believe that these offenders entered into the seminary as straight heterosexual men and flip-flopped because of seminary life. I think the absolute bulk of them came in with either homosexual tendencies at the very least, or were full blown active homosexuals. The question really is, do all seminaries make a sincere effort to screen candidates to eliminate those with homosexual tendencies, etc. or are they not? If a homosexual wants into the seminary bad enough, couldn’t they just lie about it? If enough of them lie about it over many, many years, couldn’t that explain the problem we are having currently? How can that be fixed?