Married Catholic Priests Call On Vatican For “Optional Celibacy”

[ProlifeMD]

The economic issues are not germaine to the question. The argument would then be that we want a cheap church. Are we saying that God is very limited financially? It is too easy to go to churches other people paid to build and barely support them. We were in a beautiful church that was built in the middle of the depression with a huge italian marble sanctuary, altar and altar rail. It was built by poor people in a depression. They could have managed to support a married clergy. Lets leave economics that are convenient for us out of the discussion.

I am sure the armed services could do very well with unmarried soldiers, sailors, and airmen. They could be paid less and the military would have fewer complications to deal with when they die in the line of duty.

Marriage is much more than sex, so don’t simply accuse priests who see a problem with celibacy of wanting sex. Recognize that it could be a very lonely life for some. Why is this? Are we to blame?

This is an issue that will have to be discussed reponsibly.

 

[fix]

This from Cardinal Ratzinger:

In this sense, celibacy has a christological and an apostolic meaning at the same time. The point is not simply to save time — so I then have a little bit more time at my disposal because I am not a father of a family. That would be too primitive and pragmatic a way to see things. The point is really an existence that stakes everything on God and leaves out precisely the one thing that normally makes a human existence fulfilled with a promising future.

The poorer an age is in faith, the more frequent the falls. This robs celibacy of its credibility and obscures the real point of it. People need to get straight in their minds that times of crisis for celibacy are always times of crisis for marriage as well. For, as a matter of fact, today we are experiencing not only violations of celibacy; marriage itself is becoming increasingly fragile as the basis of our society. In the legislation of Western nations we see how it is increasingly placed on the same level as other forms and is thereby largely “dissolved” as a legal form. Nor is the hard work needed really to live marriage negligible. Put in practical terms, after the abolition of celibacy we would only have a different kind of problem with divorced priests. That is not unknown in the Protestant Churches. In this sense, we see, of course, that the lofty forms of human existence involve great risks…

 

[ProlifeMD]

Now that is germaine. Thanks, Fix.

 

[KathleenElsie]

The economic issues are not germaine to the question. The argument would then be that we want a cheap church. Are we saying that God is very limited financially? It is too easy to go to churches other people paid to build and barely support them. We were in a beautiful church that was built in the middle of the depression with a huge italian marble sanctuary, altar and altar rail. It was built by poor people in a depression. They could have managed to support a married clergy. Lets leave economics that are convenient for us out of the discussion.

I am sure the armed services could do very well with unmarried soldiers, sailors, and airmen. They could be paid less and the military would have fewer complications to deal with when they die in the line of duty.

Marriage is much more than sex, so don’t simply accuse priests who see a problem with celibacy of wanting sex. Recognize that it could be a very lonely life for some. Why is this? Are we to blame?

This is an issue that will have to be discussed responsibly.

I believe that the issue of loneliness is to an extent caused by the moving of priests from parish to parish. As someone that was moved 14 times from home to home as a child I can attest to not wanting to make friends because you know they will leave or you will leave and it hurts toooo much. So part of the “cure” might be what the Orthodox and Byzantine do, leave the priest where he is unless he requests to be moved.