Interesting article about the priesthood

[Monica4316]

I found this interesting article on the relation of marriage and the priesthood: newtheologicalmovement.blogspot.ca/2013/09/married-priests-ritual-purity-and.html

as we know in the Latin rite, priests are celibate, and in the Eastern rites, they could be married but (from what I understand) only before their ordination.

The priest who wrote this article says that maybe the reason priests in the Latin rite don’t marry is because of issues with ritual cleanliness, but then he thinks maybe that’s not the case, because ritual cleanliness in the Church has changed over time and is dismissed in cases of necessity. Then, he says that maybe the reason priests don’t marry (even in the East, they can’t marry after ordination) is because of the priesthood being a higher state in life. Priestly celibacy can help to reflect that, as in the West, although in the East, they are allowed to be married.

I had a question from all this… Must Eastern priests be married? or can they choose to remain celibate?

 

[GEddie]

In a book from 1821, I read that in the Russian Orthodox Church, priests were required to be married, and that a priest who lost his wife would either become a monk or return to the laity.

ICXC NIKA

 

[phil19034]

I had a question from all this… Must Eastern priests be married? or can they choose to remain celibate?

Eastern Catholic priests can choose to remain celibate. As a matter of fact, Eastern monks must be celibate and Eastern Bishops are celibate.

 

[SyroMalankara]

Neither Eastern nor Western deacons/priests must be celibate. If they chose to be celibate by deacon, it should remain, unless he chooses laicization. Bishops in all Churches, East and West are celibate by Tradition, but even this isn’t set in stone. The Assyrian Church in the 1960s thought about allowing bishops to be married, and the Roman Catholic Church in Brazil once accepted a married schismatic as bishop, I believe it was approved by St. JP2

The norm is as we usually see, but numerous exceptions could be pointed to

 

[Medical_Student]

Neither Eastern nor Western deacons/priests must be celibate. If they chose to be celibate by deacon, it should remain, unless he chooses laicization. Bishops in all Churches, East and West are celibate by Tradition, but even this isn’t set in stone. The Assyrian Church in the 1960s thought about allowing bishops to be married, and the Roman Catholic Church in Brazil once accepted a married schismatic as bishop, I believe it was approved by St. JP2

The norm is as we usually see, but numerous exceptions could be pointed to

Some Syriac Churches in the early church even had bishops marry after episcopacy! Awesome.