Pope Francis open to having some married men become priests

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ALREADY married men may become Priests at the time they are ordained (just as we have in Eastern Rites and with some exceptions in the Latin Rite).

But if the Church deviates from this practice, if Priests are allowed to marry beyond ordination, then divorce and REMARRIAGE is going to be an issue.**

Then pastoral principles will need to be applied to them too.

Usagi. You said:
A divorced man already cannot remarry so long as his wife lives, and while a lay man might get around that (at least legally) by marrying outside the Church, it seems unlikely a priest would be permitted to do that and remain a priest.
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Let’s look at that again focusing on the hypothetical application of already single Priests at some time being allowed to marry (yes to my knowledge too, this has NEVER occurred but that has not stopped people from calling for it) . . . .
A divorced man already cannot remarry so long as his wife lives, . . . . it seems unlikely a priest would be permitted to do that and remain a priest.
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WHY?

In principle. . . WHY should you INCLUDE at least SOME divorced and re-married LAITY into reception of Holy Communion, yet EXCLUDE divorced and re-married PRIESTS from the public exercise of their ministerial Priesthood?

On WHAT principle would you EXCLUDE those Priests?

** I am not saying the Church should allow widowed or never-been-married Priests to get married, should not allow it, or that it is even possible to allow this (on this thread).
 
I don’t know how married priests will have the time for their family as well as all their duties running a parish. Many churches only have one priest, who is pretty much working overtime every week to keep up with just their church duties. They would have no time to spend with their wife or children. I don’t think it’s a good idea unless we go back to the days of multiple priests per parish. There would certainly be more people interested in the priesthood if marriage was allowed, but I don’t think there would be enough of an increase to eliminate this problem. Maybe in some parts of the world though.
 
Cathoholic said:
Just some personal musings on these issues (because this question raises many others too so it really isn’t just “one issue” with a question such as this. And I don’t think it is supposed to be just “one issue” with a question like this) . . . .

Does this merely mean more already-married-men being brought into the Priesthood (veri probati)?

Or does it mean single Priests now being able to “date”, various women and marry as a Priest?

Can Priests “court” their parishoners?

Can Priests just date women? Or would dating men be OK too (this issue WILL come up. It is not merely hypothetical rhetoric)? How many wives not just in a polygammous sense, but even if your wife dies, can a Priest then take another? If he’s had MORE than ONE wife, can he be ordained to the episcopacy (the Bishops office)?

Because these questions WILL come up. These are not merely rhetorical questions!

What about Amoris Laetitia and what it does and doesn’t mean?

There is already many **unanswered questions raised by people who are intelectually well formed **concerning Amoris Laetitia, even Bishops and Cardinals are disagreeing about how we are to deal with divorced and remarried laity and reception of Holy Communion.

Pope Francis has publicly said he enjoys “debating” these people who are confused about divorced and remarried people receiving Holy Communion so perhaps we will soon be having this “debate” publicly.

Opening the proverbial floodgates to more married men in the priesthood will force the divorce and remarriage issue to be adequately addressed with authority, because it will be applied to** divorced and remarried Priests**.

This may be good (to force us to more precisely define things), it may serve as a source of scandal, or both.

Then other associated issues still need to be defined, doubts answered, etc. Issues such as fornication, polygammy, and same sex issues.

Are we really ready to broaden the scope of these issues without dealing with the doubts and questions that already remain?

All of these questions such as polygammy, fornication, same-sex issues, etc. have already been brought into the discussion by Bishops, based upon using principles of Amoris Laetitia they have said.

But so far, answers to issues and doubts, and muddled differing interpretations are only based upon unauthoritative “local” interpretations. Some of the Bishops haven’t said anything publicly. Others are at odds with one another.

The question should be asked: "Do we want to see these examples played out in the public with Catholic Priests the way we are currently seeing it played out with Catholic laity??

Maybe that would be a good thing. Maybe not so good.
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I don’t see these issues coming up. Not in serious circles. There is a long tradition of the Chuech ordaining married men to the priesthood. The idea of a priest taking a wife is unthinkable East or West. Big difference. Orthodox or Eastern Catholic married priests do not take a second wife if widowed.
 
pianistclare said:
The pastor of my former parish said that allowing married priests is a slap in the face to him and all the other men who would have loved to get married and have a pile of kids…but they responded to the unmistakable call to give up such for love of Christ and to be a visible sign of Christ’s presence in the world.
Said if that were the case, he’d leave.
No kidding. He said it would have been all for nothing.
Said every single day is a renewed commitment. One that he feels is distinct, and that he happily makes for Christ.
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With all due respect to that priest, what a scandalous and appalling thing to say. If he was called to the priesthood he was also called to celibacy. Period. That was HIS vocation. The Church has the power to bind and to loose. The Church alone confirms vocations. Who is he, priest or not, to judge Holy Mother Church? She confirmed him in his vocation to celibacy. We all have our own vocation. Some men are called to both marriage and priesthood. That is their vocation. And yes all Catholics MUST believe this for the Church does ordain married men to the priesthood - in both the Eastern Catholic Churches and in the Anglican Ordinariates. Yet even in those jurisdictions some men are called to celibacy. There will always be celibacy. It is intrinsic to religious life but not to the priesthood.
 
RCbkr said:
I understand the allowing of former Anglican clergy who become Catholic to also, after a period of prayer, study, and discernment, become Catholic priests, but if it should become the norm that Catholic priests can be married, the church should probably be prepared to deal with divorced priests. I know of divorced, and sometimes remarried, protestant clergy. How about a dating priest? Perhaps we should be praying more for priests vocations.
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Dating priests wouldn’t be an issue; following ordination, priests would still be unable to marry.
 
josh987654321 said:
Sad. Reminds me of 2 Timothy 4:3, Itching ears. The ‘exceptions’ for ‘small communities’ with priest shortages will become the norm, just as some ‘rare’ exception is used to argue for the legislation of same sex marriage, abortion, euthanasia etc.

Matthew 16:25
*25 For whoever would save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. *

“For the sake of His sorrowful passion, have mercy on us and on the whole world.”

Please pray for the Holy Father and the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. It’s very much needed.

Thank you for reading
Josh
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The comparison of ordaining married men (changing what is a church discipline - not dogma, or natural law) - with abortion, same sex marriage, or euthanasia is perfectly absurd.
 
Cathoholic said:
If you don’t think veri probati will result in people calling for single already ordained Priests to be allowed to be married too that’s your prediction. I am OK with you thinking that.
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Oh, I’m sure there will be calls for it, because I suspect most people don’t understand the distinction. But in terms of the history and tradition of the Church, there is a huge distinction. Deciding to ordain (more) married men has plenty of precedent. Allowing the ordained to (re)marry has little or none, would bring us further from our Eastern brethren rather than nearer, and introduces the complications you mention.
 
twf. You said (parenthetical addition mine) . . . .
I don’t see these issues (of single married Priests having the ability to get married) coming up. Not in serious circles.
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I think you are right twf. I concur.

But I also thought the discussion of reception for Holy Communion for people in second or third or fourth marriages or any other “irregular” situations would not come up for consideration three of four years ago either.

But I was wrong. It HAS come up and there ARE differing applications even by Bishops who do not agree with one another.

I still don’t think single Priests will be put forth as marital candidates by any serious push from within the Vatican. But I could be wrong.
 
Usagi. You mentioned . . .
Deciding to ordain (more) married men has plenty of precedent. Allowing the ordained to (re)marry has little or none, would bring us further from our Eastern brethren rather than nearer, and introduces the complications you mention.
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I get it. I agree with that.

Yet this issue will possibly at least be considered sometime down the line. And perhaps rightly so.

After all, Pope John Paul II the Great, went to great lengths years ago to reconcile Archbishop Malingo who got (civilly) married.

Pope John Paul II attempted to render a pastoral solution to what was and is a problematic situation.

Archbishop Malingo ended up leaving the Church after vacillating.

But I suspect if Archbishop Malingo was willing, there could have been some sort of pastoral solution for him.

Our Holy Father Pope Francis likewise reached out to Priests who chose to leave their ministry and marry (here).

Our Holy Father did NOT offer them their ministerial positions back (that I am aware of), but the situation has the potential for some sort of pastoral solution I suspect.

Religionnews.com even ended their article saying (parenthetical addition mine) . . . .
His (Pope Francis’) latest Friday visit may hearten those in Italy and around the world who have urged the pope to review the church’s long-standing policy of mandatory celibacy.
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How can pastoral applications be applied to these men, without encouraging other ministerial Priests who have lived out their fidelity to do this leave-to-marry too?

I don’t know.

I am not even suggesting this type of reconciliation with laicized Priests with their former ministry should be done . . . . or should not be done.

I am just watching, praying, and learning.

Afterall . . . . .
**You can observe a lot by watching—Yogi Berra **
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The true answer to the above debate can be found in the answer to this question: was Christ married?

If not, then why is it fitting that the priest, Alter Christus, should be married?

One cannot take the concessions made by the early Apostolic Church as normative today, as some Protestant denominations do. Celibacy has compelling theological reasons to support it, and it is not a discipline that should be lightly set aside.

I can understand the concession made to Anglican converts (which gave us Fr. Longenecker and Fr. Richard Cipolla), but there is absolutely no need to introduce this disciplinary change in Holy Mother Church at this moment in time. 🙂
 
7_Sorrows said:
I just read your posts so I might be confused about divorced priests not remarrying. You are correct I believe about widowed priests not remarrying.
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Hey Sorrows 🙂

I meant it in regards to the original post and thread title regarding the idea of married priests. If this is their idea of getting more priests, by lowering the bar and making it like just some job or trying to make the priests on par with us laity, then it is destined to backfire.

Reminds me of when I hear of a Protestant Church introduce something silly and sensationalist in an effort to bring people to their Church. Maybe they get a temporary spike when they first do it, but it always ends up backfiring on them and they end up worse than before.

I hope this has helped

God Bless You

Thank you for reading
Josh
 
dixieagle said:
The comparison of ordaining married men (changing what is a church discipline - not dogma, or natural law) - with abortion, same sex marriage, or euthanasia is perfectly absurd.
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Not when you consider the arguments I believe. First you say it’s only a discipline and not dogma, then they will say it’s already happening so why can’t it be the norm? like I said, itching ears. Priests should not be married, they are celibate.

Abortion on demand, Euthanasia and Same Sex Marriage don’t just happen overnight, peoples resistances to them are slowly broken down.

I hope this has helped

God Bless You

Thank you for reading
Josh
 
josh987654321 said:
Not when you consider the arguments I believe. First you say it’s only a discipline and not dogma, then they will say it’s already happening so why can’t it be the norm? like I said, itching ears. Priests should not be married, they are celibate.

Abortion on demand, Euthanasia and Same Sex Marriage don’t just happen overnight, peoples resistances to them are slowly broken down.

I hope this has helped

God Bless You

Thank you for reading
Josh
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As pointed out earlier there are two issues.

Priests marrying is one thing and has always been forbidden universally in all apostolic churches even outside the Catholic church.

But married men becoming priests is another issue and it has always been practiced universally among all apostolic churches since the beginning. So this has been a part of the catholic church continuously for 2,000 years.

In fact, it is the practice of NOT ordaining ANY married men into the priesthood in the Latin church (celibates only) that is new in the church. For the first centuries, even in western Europe, the Latin church ordained married men before making it a strict rule to ordained celibates only rather late in the game.

St. Peter was a married man who was called as an apostle of Christ, ordained a priest and bishop and became pope all while still married. In one of st. Paul’s letters, he gives as a requirement for being a bishop that a man has to be the husband of only one wife. So, in the lives of the apostles we have both examples of married priests and celibate priests.

The practice of ordaining only celibate men is not universal even in the Catholic church. It is a Latin discipline and even then it came centuries after the Latin church had been ordaining married men.

I personally think that given a choice between two evils: shortage of priests on one hand and the loss of a millenium old Latin tradition of a celibate-only priesthood on the other: we ought to pick the one that allows us to have enough priests for all our people rather than choose to overburden priests with extremely large parishes and administrative tasks that don’t even involve pastoring.

The only criteria on ordination in this regard besides the right age and gender ought to be the faith/orthodoxy and personal holiness of the persons who present themselves for ordination.

A priest is someone who should be able to teach the faith of the apostles to his flock well and to help them to live it in their day to day lives. Really that is it.

But somewhere down the line we lost the plot.

Now we have Cardinals who are not even convinced that Jesus performed any miracles, like Cardinal Kasper, having all sorts of influence in the church and trying to get the church to abandon its faith and morality.

I think that happens when a church forgets the POINT of the things it does, like having actual pastors in parishes.

I think people are freaking out because of Pope Francis’ other stances. They don’t trust him based on other opinions he has expressed on other issues. But really, the suggestion of ordaining married men is a great one.

I just wish the pope had focused on such prudential issues in his reform right from the beginning and left those unavoidably doctrinal matters calling to question the concepts of sin, repentance and communion alone. I believe even people like Cardinals Burke and the rest would have fully gone along with such reforms that do not threaten the faith and might even serve to revive it and we would have had great reforms without any of the division and scandal.
 
Fox did not report accurately. I noticed someone opened a new thread from an article with better journalism, at least more accurate.

catholicculture.org/news/headlines/index.cfm?storyid=30953&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+CatholicWorldNewsFeatureStories+%28Catholic+World+News+%28on+CatholicCulture.org%29%29
Pope Francis indicated that he is open to discussion of ordination for married men,…
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However, the Pope dismissed suggestions that celibacy should be optional, saying that “voluntary celibacy is not a solution.” He showed greater willingness to discuss ordination of mature married men.
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Open to discussion is not the same as open to married priests. So FOX’s hype, “In a move that could transform the Catholic Church,” is just hype, not reporting.
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My bad. The other thread was opened by a newsbot.
 
He supposedly made such comments as early as 2013 or 2014 already but the establishment hasn’t gone for it and who knows if and when it would ever happen. I think if he really wanted to he’d have simply done it already.
 
DignumEtJustum said:
He supposedly made such comments as early as 2013 or 2014 already but the establishment hasn’t gone for it and who knows if and when it would ever happen. I think if he really wanted to he’d have simply done it already.
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“The pope goes slow because he wants to be sure that the changes have a deep impact. The slow pace is necessary to ensure the effectiveness of the changes. He knows there are those hoping that the next pope will turn everything back around. If you go slowly it’s more difficult to turn things back…”

“The pope must have his reasons, because he knows very well what he’s doing. He must have an objective that we don’t understand yet. You have to realize that he is aiming at reform that is irreversible. If one day he should intuit that he’s running out of time and doesn’t have enough time to do what the Spirit is asking him, you can be sure he will speed up.”

Archbishop Víctor Manuel Fernández
Ghostwriter of Amoris Laetitia and Laudato Si’

chiesa.espresso.repubblica.it/articolo/1351303bdc4.html?eng=y
 
twf said:
With all due respect to that priest, what a scandalous and appalling thing to say. If he was called to the priesthood he was also called to celibacy. Period. That was HIS vocation. The Church has the power to bind and to loose. The Church alone confirms vocations. Who is he, priest or not, to judge Holy Mother Church? She confirmed him in his vocation to celibacy. We all have our own vocation. Some men are called to both marriage and priesthood. That is their vocation. And yes all Catholics MUST believe this for the Church does ordain married men to the priesthood - in both the Eastern Catholic Churches and in the Anglican Ordinariates. Yet even in those jurisdictions some men are called to celibacy. There will always be celibacy. It is intrinsic to religious life but not to the priesthood.
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That “visible sign” and it’s removal is what destroyed the convents, remember?
I’m out.
He’s a good priest.
 
pianistclare said:
That “visible sign” and it’s removal is what destroyed the convents, remember?
I’m out.
He’s a good priest.
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He should know that Jesus’ first chosen priests were married men. If he has a problem with married priests he has a problem with Him who instituted the priesthood.
 
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