Permanent Deacons

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ineedofanswers said:
[1] The death of a spouse when the couple is still young, the divorced deacon…these are realities, tragic but real.

[2] I like what was offered here about King David. Diamond Girl your heart is full of love.

[3] A permanent deacon should have the support of his wife. Its what will enable him to serve the community. It is her sacrifice that enables the Deacon to perform his duties.

[4] I had said in a prior post this not just about sexuality. I do struggle with being alone and the struggle of living without a spouse, however there is another issue. Yes the Church may or may not grant a dispensation for a Deacon with small children, not only do the children need a mother but for most in this economy they need to incomes to suport the chidren and themselves.

[5] The pain of having studied and prayed for so long, just to deal with all this when i was still freshly ordained. My wife was able to conceal her motives and actions very well while i studied to be a Deacon. So Yes i am blessed every time I minister to families through baptism, marriages and funerals. and yes i cannot live without the Eucharist.

[6] The Church that i have loved with all my heart throughout my life tries so hard to make sure that all the rubrics are followed and that is great. But When Jesus the just judge, when the bridegroom comes for his church He will judge us by how much of Gods love we have in our hearts. … If any of you ever meet a deacon in a situation like mine. show him love.

[7] Celibacy is a Gift…Mathew 19 read verse 12 especially…read prayerfully. I believe that i have not been granted (given this beautiful gift)
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  1. Which is why St. Paul did not allow widows to vow celibacy until they hit 60 (1Timothy 5:9-12). Which is why the Vatican was foolish to allow married deacons as young as 35. Obviously this passage was not grappled with during the discussions on this topic - an arbitrary age was just thrown out willy-nilly.
  2. Love does not mean giving someone a dispensation from his promises because he is struggling to faithfully live them after such a tragic situation. That is false charity. True charity says “I am sorry, but this is the promise you made to God, and I want to help you be faithful to that”.
  3. A permanent deacon promises to be celibate if he loses his wife (either to divorce or death), which means that he, like the priest, needs God to be his support. HE will enable the deacon to serve the community, just like He enables the priest.
  4. (a) It is easy to say that one wants a wife for the children, but often enough, the main motivation is that the deacon is lonely and wants a wife to share his life with. (b) Another reason men with young children should not be ordained to the diaconate.
  5. (a) You make it sound as though you were the perfect husband and your wife was just a floosy. If I were to ask her, she would probably say you were putting her second-fiddle to your newfound “love” - ministry in the Church. You would not be the first deacon to lose his wife after he started having “an affair” with diaconal ministry. Perhaps she felt lonely and in need of intimacy - sort of like the way you feel now. You speak about what the Church should do for you in that situation - what should the Church have done for your wife in that situation? (b) You speak about baptising, marrying, and saying funerals - what about your ministry to charity? Is that not the chief ministry of the deacon? When you say this about the sacraments (which is what a priest chiefly is - a man who is ordained in order to confect the sacraments), it makes me think what you really wanted was the priesthood - but since diaconate was all that the Church allowed you as a married man, you took that instead. But deacons with wives and children are not as free to serve as celibate priests are.
  6. (a) Love is “to will or to do good for another”. In reference to God, that means living out our vows and promises with the help of His grace. You cannot draw a dichotomy between “rubrics” and “love” - obedience to rules is an act of love. Of course, one can be obedient to rules and not do them out of love. But on the other hand, if one disobeys legitimate Church rules (and the very promises he made), he is failing to love God thereby. (b) I am honestly sorry to say I really do not know how much sympathy I can muster as a result. But I will do my best to love you like a Christian brother.
  7. Celibacy is a gift that you received because you promised to embrace it and God gave you that gift and that grace at that very moment and it will last with you forever. To say you have not been granted the gift is to say God is a liar who does not make good on His promises.
Once again, this is all confirming me in my opposition to the ordination of young men to the diaconate.
 
well …micheal…we agree on one matter…The Church does ordain men to young.

As far me being a perfect husband I will never deny that when we were seventeen both my wife and I did not know the first thing about church teaching…The Church allowed these to babies to marry…I do not blame the Church for anything that has occurred to me or my ex wife. We were both at fault for never really discovering what intimacy in marriage really is…We both committed sins against God and our marriage.

Then we heard the Gospel and our lives changed…for 15 years we served the church together…lay leaders together…We both sacrificed a large portion of our personal life together to the community.

She continues working today as a DRE…and I am a Deacon…we have three adult children…one just came home after serving 5 years in Iraq.

Although we serve in different parishes…We talk from time to time mainly about our children that we both love dearly. We have forgiven each other and we are as close to friends as we can be.

I have never desired to be a priest…ever…I thank God for the Good priest that God has given us without wich we could not recieve the body and blood of our Lord.

Diamond girls heart is close to the kingdom.

Jesus said that he did not come into the world to condemn it.

and Thank God has filled my heart with light and I am convinced that i should be an example of that light and love to all, as best i can and with God’s help!

We get so cuaght up in the Law and what is reasonable the we forget about love.

God Is Love…

We are not God…we are his children and if you are a father or a mother you understand that a parent wants whats best for a child…including discipline.

God would never will his children to be miserable…

God Bless you…

Thank you for all that you have explained…i am grateful for it…It does help…

Pray for me!
 
A nice post, ineedofanswers.

Be assured of my prayers!

And keep us all updated …
 
Michael_Saint said:
After debating whether or not to respond to this post - because I do not want to get bogged down in another argument with Lapey and because I have other writings that should take precedence over this exchange - I have nonetheless decided to give in and respond.
  1. As I told Lapey in our personal correspondence, every deacon says he could not see himself remarrying another woman if his wife was to die. That’s easy to say when you’re married, but after a few years of celibacy, a person’s tune changes pretty quickly. As other (married) posters have said on these forums, once you have experienced sexual pleasure and the other pleasures associated with marriage, it’s pretty tough to Not be married or sexually active. Yes, it’s been done by others, but by way of exception.
  2. It should be hard (if not impossible) to get a dispensation. Deacons make a promise to God not to remarry if their wives die. Promises should be honoured. The Church should not lose any good deacons - they should be faithful to their promise and continue to minister. Marriage is also a promise…divorce also happens…dispensations also are grated.
  3. I do not think you understand the “promise” of celibacy a deacon takes simply based on what you are saying here. You seem to first of all have a skewed or deficient view on the call to celibacy - the beauty of that call, that one does not lose anything but exchanges a human spouse for a heavenly spouse, etc. It seems that in diaconate training, there is little to nothing said about the beauties and glories of celibacy. I do understand the promise , however I do not agree, big difference!
  4. He is not a “lay minister” - he is “ordained”. This is another proof to me that there is something deficient in what he was taught and how he was formed (which you took part in, correct?) Yes, I was in class and I made a typo, please forgive me…I ment to say married ordained deacon but was on another thought, deleted part and this is what I ended up with…sorry
  5. As they say, “dirt happens” in life. Some men who fought in the war had injuries which would not allow them to have sexual intercourse. Some men make promises to God that require them to be celibate a little earlier than they had hoped. I think the former has as much reason to say “it’s not fair” as the latter, but that is where God steps in with his Providential will and grace and turns evil to good. It’s just like people who say abortion should be allowed in the case of rape and incest because it was not the mother’s fault. But that doesn’t change the fact that there is a baby, a human being, in the womb. And the fact that your wife cheated on you and left you (and I don’t buy that the man was perfect in that situation - many deacons’ wives cheat on them after they start putting their work in the Church over their duties as husbands and fathers and neglect their families) still does not change the fact you made a promise. Again, my opinion and sometimes we need to forgive and give a second chance to a broken promise, like annulments…I never mentioned abortion by the way…and nobody is perfect.
  6. Exactly - and when it’s not our fault, we make the best of the situation we find ourselves in (which includes having made a promise of celibacy). And God is there with His grace to help us through it and to be faithful.
  7. There is much to say here. I will just say this: the solution to the priest shortage is not to make the rules laxer. Vatican II teaches this.
  8. And I will conclude by saying all of this confirms me in my disapproval of ordination of men that young (44) to the diaconate.
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My husband is a wonderful deacon and I disagree…age should not be a factor for the deactican.
 
diamond_girl said:
My husband is a wonderful deacon and I disagree…age should not be a factor for the deactican.
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The way you responded to my answers made it seem like I said a lot of the things at the end of all those paragraphs. It was very hard for me to decipher - others would find it impossible, because I know what I wrote and how I write, others probably need to look back to figure it out.

The result is that most will not pay any attention to your responses which were found in the shaded part underneath “Michael Saint said:”

Please use the colour feature to distinguish next time please.

This statement: “Marriage is also a promise…divorce also happens…dispensations also are grated” shows me you lack a basic Catholic understanding of marriage. Divorce does not dispense one from his previous vows - an annulment permits a subsequent marriage but only beause there was no marriage in the first place. Are you sure that was just a typo earlier?

I know you didn’t mention abortion - what is your point? I am using an analogy, just like you did with marriage and divorce when speaking of promises of celibacy and dispensations. Should I say to you, “diamondgirl, I never said anything about annulments, by the way”?

That your husband is a wonderful deacon disproves nothing of what I said - not a single point. That is what we call a “red herring”.
 
I just wanted to throw out that Marriage is also a promise. Many times the marriage is disolved, again because one cheated. The argument that both parties are to blame is so blindsided. Each situation is different and where I do not believe an annulment should be given out like “candy”, I do believe in the second chance annulment provides. I have been witness to two marriages that were ruined by one person. The other did everything right and lived their promise, vows. Why should that person have to suffer for the other? Sometimes people do just give up and don’t try to work things out, but it’s not fair to insinuate all people who have divorced fall into this.

In the same respect I understand what a vow is, what a promise a permanent deacon makes. My husband had NO problem with it. I did. And because we don’t know what will happen, I make my point. Nobody expects to break a promise, a vow, but we do and sometimes we can appreciate that second chance, that annulment, that dispensation. Many good deacons do make very difficult choices. You may disagree and say they know what they got into. That is correct but sometimes we never think we will fall into a situation and we do!

It doesn’t mean we have to agree or disagree with it but annulments and dispensations both exist.

Also, I was in class with my husband and it was made CLEAR he was an ordained minister, not a lay minister. I was typing another thought and changed my thought and what I got was lay minister. NO, I’m not that stupid. I apologize and although I may challenge the promises, vows and rules of the ordained deacon. I know them, understand them but do not agree because lives change without notice and again, sometimes we don’t expect to be in that situation.

Enough from me I think you all get my points. I just wanted to throw in my thoughts from a wife’s point of view and again it’s not every wife’s opinion, just mine.

God Bless
 
This statement: “Marriage is also a promise…divorce also happens…dispensations also are grated” shows me you lack a basic Catholic understanding of marriage. Divorce does not dispense one from his previous vows - an annulment permits a subsequent marriage but only beause there was no marriage in the first place. Are you sure that was just a typo earlier?

An annulment does not provide a “second chance” - because there was no marriage in the first place.

I know you didn’t mention abortion - what is your point? I am using an analogy, just like you did with marriage and divorce when speaking of promises of celibacy and dispensations. Should I say to you, “diamondgirl, I never said anything about annulments, by the way”?

That your husband is a wonderful deacon disproves nothing of what I said - not a single point. That is what we call a “red herring”.
 
Michael_Saint said:
The way you responded to my answers made it seem like I said a lot of the things at the end of all those paragraphs. It was very hard for me to decipher - others would find it impossible, because I know what I wrote and how I write, others probably need to look back to figure it out.

The result is that most will not pay any attention to your responses which were found in the shaded part underneath “Michael Saint said:”

Please use the colour feature to distinguish next time please.

This statement: “Marriage is also a promise…divorce also happens…dispensations also are grated” shows me you lack a basic Catholic understanding of marriage. Divorce does not dispense one from his previous vows - an annulment permits a subsequent marriage but only beause there was no marriage in the first place. Are you sure that was just a typo earlier?

I know you didn’t mention abortion - what is your point? I am using an analogy, just like you did with marriage and divorce when speaking of promises of celibacy and dispensations. Should I say to you, “diamondgirl, I never said anything about annulments, by the way”?

That your husband is a wonderful deacon disproves nothing of what I said - not a single point. That is what we call a “red herring”.
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Whatever you say…
 
diamond_girl said:
Again it’s not every wife’s opinion, just mine.
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Thank God for that! We have too many people today who do not take promises and vows as seriously as the Church does (permanent despite whatever may happen - read the catechism) - and it is even worse when that comes from the wife of a cleric.

A dispensation is always something the Church grants with great sadness. Read Sacerdotalis Caelibatus in the section on granting dispensations to priests who want to leave. You can almost see the sorrow on Paul VI’s face when he speaks about it.
 
Michael_Saint said:
In other words, who gives a darn about any valid points I may have made, eh?
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Problem is, it seems in every conversation it is only your points that are valid. That is quite unfortunate.

You have never experienced first hand what you choose to “instruct” everyone on here. Some of us are and will be and have been experiencing these issues as you will probably never.

BTW, i bet the Vatican will be glad to know you disagree with the rules on the Permanent diaconate do not comply with your wishes.

PS. I never heard back from you. Did I back you into a corner in which you couldn’t escape? You must learn to face your fears or you will never grow spiritually!!!

Gary
 
Lapey said:
BTW, i bet the Vatican will be glad to know you disagree with the rules on the Permanent diaconate do not comply with your wishes.

PS. I never heard back from you. Did I back you into a corner in which you couldn’t escape? You must learn to face your fears or you will never grow spiritually!!!
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Many at the Vatican agree with my evaluation of the permanent diaconate.

What is the role of a theologian, Gary? Your diaconate training should have taught you that a theologian works through these issues, and is given the latitude by the Vatican to disagree with Vatican rules in his work. Sometimes the Vatican in the end agrees with his work, sometimes the Vatican does not agree. Very seldomly the Vatican condemns the work of a theologian - and only if it dissents from faith and morals (not disciplinary rulings). Theology always precedes Dogmatic statements and Disciplinary changes - in fact, that is how these things are arrived at.

If by backing into a corner you mean continuing to disregard the points and fallaciously responding to them in order to wear me out and win an argument, then yes you did.

Were you a bully in school? Were you a hot jock or football player in high school? What you did then is what you are doing now - only through argument.

People can go back and re-read the thread where we were discussing these issues for themselves, and decide if I was backed into a corner, or if you just wore me down with red herrings, such as I can`t respond to the issues you raise so I will just share from the heart and from what is on my mind.

For anyone interested, you can go here: forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=449104&page=4

I have also posted a poll regarding our previous exchange (from April) on the Philosophy forum. If you will not take my word for it, hopefully you will take the word of others who are skilled in this area.

Unlike you, Gary, I do not feel the need to have the last word.
 
But since you insist, I will reply to your last two correspondences.

You said: Is it the way in which the permanent diaconate was reinstituted or the fact that it was reinstituted in general that you are in disagreement? It sure is starting to seem like the later. I get the feeling you want or expect me to come to the realization that the diaconate is wrong for me and I should resign from formation. Why is that? There is nothing you or James the Older can say to make me disbelieve the Church and my knowledge of being called to holy orders. So why should I contact him to hear what I have already heard? One other question, is the Church wrong in its reinstitution of the permanent diaconate?

My response: (1) The way it was instituted was problematic. I have no problem with older men whose children are grown being ordained to the diaconate - as I explained earlier in the thread (which had you been open to listening to what I was trying to say you would have known and not had to ask this question). (2) The Church was imprudent, not wrong on its reinstitution of the permanent diaconate - just as the Church was imprudent about a lot of changes that took place rapidly in the 60s and 70s. Ratzinger (now Benedict XVI) has himself been a critic of many of them - I am sure in your formation for the diaconate you read some of those?

You also said: Here is part of a conversation with James the Older. At your suggesting I did contact him and discussed several points, as you can see he suggested I share this with you. I hope this note finds you doing well. It appears that you decided not to communicate with me any longer, which is your choice. I wish you well in your endeavors! As I expected, I had nothing to be concerned about by contacting him. He has reaffirmed what I already suspected, that I am on the right track. I pray you find your calling and attack it with as much fervor as I am attacking mine. PS. This will be my last correspondence with you unless you answer back and ask to continue. Part of that conversation with James included: According to Michael you were going to tell me how I was not supposed to be a deacon. How me and my kids are too young. But instead you have reiterated our formation leaders, my bishop and my pastor. The message is consistent and strong..

My response: (1) I suggested you contact him not because he was going to tell you how you were not supposed to be a deacon, but because he was saying some of the same things I was saying, and I thought you might listen to him because you were not listening to me. You were not taking me seriously because you saw me as someone who was younger than you, unmarried, and thus wholly unqualified to be speaking about anything I spoke about. You were trying to diagnose me and help me deal with my issues. In other words, you saw me as a potential area for your ministry, trying to reach out to this slightly troubled young man. There is a lot of arrogance in that. (2) That being said, James the Older seems to be a bit contradictory in what he said to me vis-a-vis what he said to you. He said in the thread, If you are a young father of children, I would ask that you delay your admission to study for the diaconate. So I do not know what to make of his comments to you. I believe he feels your children are not too young. I may have misunderstood his original comment about young children and just what he was talking about.

That being said, my next correspondence will not be with you but with Bishop Jacobs. Your penchant for getting into conversations that are beyond your grasp (as evidenced by your dodging the issue) and goading the person into submission by frustrating him with fallacious responses and ad hominem attacks, then responding by claiming victory (which you just did in this last post), is something he should be aware of. That is not the behaviour of a deacon - and I am sure your bishop would agree.
 
You totally misconstrue everything I say. That too is unfortunate. My better judgment was to not respond to you bringing me up in your conversations here with others when I had not ever mentioned you except when you were involved in the conversation. Also, I would never have brought up a private conversation on a public forum as you did, even though it was to my benefit. It was private talk and should stay private.

We are going to have to agree to disagree and get on with life.

I also do not appreciate the threat of contacting my bishop; it is out of line and mentioning him by name on this public forum is totally improper on your part. I don’t remember mentioning his name on anything but PRIVATE correspondence.

This is truly unfortunate. I apologize to all who have been dragged through this conversation; I will refrain from responding to this poster again and ask him to avoid responding to me.

Thanks,
Gary
 
The portions of what you said in private that I re-posted here is nothing you would not have said on this forum, and in fact some of it you did say in public on this forum more or less but just in different words or a different way.

You did NOT mention the name of your bishop in private - you have posted in PUBLIC the name of the diocese you are from under “About Me” on your profile page.

And it is not a mere threat - I have already written the letter and will be sending it.

And I don’t believe you when you say you will no longer respond to this poster - you MUST have the last word, as you always do.That is why you said “I will refrain from responding to this poster and ask him to refrain from responding to me”. How convenient. And that is what I did a month and a half ago - refrained from responding, as I told you in our last email (it wasn’t a case of this “backed into a corner” nonsense) but that didn’t stop you from sending two more emails and “proving” me wrong by passing along to me what James the Older said.

So no, I will not honour your request - you want to apply to me a different standard than you hold yourself. You want to force rules on others that you yourself do not abide by. No.
 
Lapey said:
We are going to have to agree to disagree and get on with life.
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That is what I said to you a month and a half ago, but you kept it going. Why now when I mention going to your bishop do you now say this?
 
I do not want to intrude, but I think that both of you should just calm down. Please bickering and making threats. Cannot we all just have a friendly discussion?
 
Just as an update - Lapey has already contacted me twice privately with emails. And the first of those emails came in before my latest responses.

So much for that being “the last word” he will speak to me. Like I said, he must have the last word. Not behaviour I would expect from a soon-to-be deacon.
 
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