Pope Francis spoke of being 'dazzled' by girl, possible change of celibacy rule

[Elizabeth502]

I think it’s interesting to speculate on just what he means by “cultural reasons.” I’d be interested in others’ interpretation of that phrase.

IThere are other theories that match eastern and western “culture” to this development, but I’m at a loss to imagine which he’s talking about. Does he simply mean in some countries and not others, but decided on “cultural” rather than “pragmatic” reasons? What reasons would qualify as cultural?* Anyone?

I think it’s undeniable that, if a move is made toward optional celibacy, that it will not include religious priests, as from the Jesuits or Franciscans. A vow of poverty is, obviously, incompatible with having a family, raising kids, etc. And it’s highly unlikely it would be “retroactive.” The east has long allowed married men to become priests. It has never (to my knowledge) allowed priests to marry.

• It’s sometimes said that Africa has such terrible priest/faithful ratios because in much of the continent a man without a wife is a man without respect. I suppose that would qualify as a cultural reason. I don’t find much solace in that reasoning.

Tim, the fact is that many African priests have been briniging their wives with them into the active Catholic priesthood. This has been happening for quite some time, or at least it was happening (prior to BXVI; I wasn’t following that particular story during BXVI’s reign). They were doing so, yes, for cultural reasons, and the continent has a whole had been experiencing a glut of priests, despite whatever Uganda’s numbers are.

It goes without saying that optional celibacy is incompatible with religious vows, so that was never on the table and would never be entertained.

No matter how we look at it,it seems to me it is a two-edged sword: Dropping the celibacy requirement non-universally creates potential morale problems, not just globally, but locally. As married Anglican priests are being absorbed in the West, it could create resentment among Catholic priests, as well as Catholic men discerning the priesthood. The sense of equality and justice is built into the Western psyche, and doesn’t vanish in the ministerial priesthood. So that arises not just with regard to Anglicans and Romans, but also with regard to “special cultural privileges.” I think this is problematic for the church. Either all secular priests in the Roman rite are allowed to bring their existing marriages into the active priesthood or no one gets to.

I.m.o., it may be to avoid this unspoken undercurrent that discourages Pope Francis from unleashing this just yet. He is a man who seems oriented toward a unfied universal Catholic Church – as well as, as you said, oriented toward even more pressing priorities.

JMO!

 

[Anthony_Joseph]

The UGCC has quite a few seminarians (as in they are forced to turn people away)

What do you mean “many of us who live in the lay state as single people must be just as celebate [sic] as any priest”? Celibacy is abstinence from marriage which laity are not forced to adhere to whereas priests absolutely must adhere to this.

Celibacy is the abstinence from sexual relations not from marriage. Single laity are called to remain celibate until they are married because of the nature of the marital act (a reflection of the Trinity and divine love) it is held to be made immoral when conducted outside of the married state.

 

[Dakota_Roberts]

Celibacy is the abstinence from sexual relations not from marriage. Single laity are called to remain celibate until they are married because of the nature of the marital act (a reflection of the Trinity and divine love) it is held to be made immoral when conducted outside of the married state.

Unless you are talking about theology in which case you use the theological definition of celibacy not the common definition. What you are talking about is part of chastity.

 

[pepipop]

i have made this point on another thread in relation to married priests.

What happens if a priest’s wife wishes to leave the catholic church and/or her husband and they have children. Can the marriage be annulled and/or the wife could ask for a civil divorce if she had left the church, could legally take her husband/priest to court to pay maintenance for the children and/or if she left the marital home and the children, how could the priest look after the children himself and also commit himself to God and his parishioners?

With the high breakdown of marriages today, this could occur just as easily within ‘catholic priest marriages’. I cannot see this doing any favours for the church’s teaching in relation to no divorce for lay catholic marriages and it could become another opening to throw stones at the church’s teachings.

Aside from that, I believe a committed priest would not wish to marry, he would either fully wish to commit his life to God and his parishioners or to a wife and family.

 

[Arizona_Mike]

It looks like NBC cherry-picked quotes from the original 2012 interview to try to make it look like he is thinking about changing the discipline. Here is the original interview with the comments in context: aleteia.org/en/religion/documents/in-2012-interview-cardinal-bergoglio-says-he-favors-keeping-celibacy-582001

The formation of priests was one of Jorge Bergoglio’s (now Pope Francis) constant concerns when he was Archbishop and Superior in the Society of Jesus. He had a conversation on the subject with Rabbi Abraham Skorka, rector of the Latin American Rabbinical Seminary. This conversation appears in the book Sobre el Cielo y la Tierra (“On the Heavens and the Earth”) published in 2012 by the Sudamericana publishing company.

Bergoglio: When I was a seminarian, I was dazzled by a girl I met at an uncle’s wedding. I was surprised by her beauty, her intellectual brilliance… and, well, I was bowled over for quite a while. I kept thinking and thinking about her. When I returned to the seminary after the wedding, I could not pray for over a week because when I tried to do so, the girl appeared in my head. I had to rethink what I was doing. I was still free because I was a seminarian, so I could have gone back home and that was it. I had to think about my choice again. I chose again – or let myself be chosen by – the religious path. It would be abnormal for this kind of thing not to happen.

When this happens, one has to get one’s bearings again. It’s a matter of one choosing again or saying, “No, what I’m feeling is very beautiful. I am afraid I won’t be faithful to my commitment later on, so I’m leaving the seminary.” When something like this happens to a seminarian, I help him go in peace to be a good Christian and not a bad priest. In the Western Church to which I belong, priests cannot be married as in the Byzantine, Ukrainian, Russian or Greek Catholic Churches. In those Churches, the priests can be married, but the bishops have to be celibate. They are very good priests. Sometimes I joke with them and tell them that they have wives at home but they did not realize that they also got a mother-in-law as part of the bargain. In Western Catholicism, some organizations are pushing for more discussion about the issue. For now, the discipline of celibacy stands firm. Some say, with a certain pragmatism, that we are losing manpower. If, hypothetically, Western Catholicism were to review the issue of celibacy, I think it would do so for cultural reasons (as in the East), not so much as a universal option.

For the moment, I am in favor of maintaining celibacy, with all its pros and cons, because we have ten centuries of good experiences rather than failures. What happens is that the scandals have an immediate impact. Tradition has weight and validity. Catholic ministers chose celibacy little by little. Up until 1100, some chose it and some did not. After, the East followed the tradition of non-celibacy as personal choice, while the West went the opposite way. It is a matter of discipline, not of faith. It can change. Personally, it never crossed my mind to marry. But there are cases. Look at the case of the Paraguayan President Fernando Lugo. He’s a brilliant guy. But as a bishop, he had a fall and resigned from the diocese. This decision was honest. Sometimes we see priests fall into this.

 

[Arizona_Mike]

continued:

Skorka: And what is your position?

Bergoglio: If one of them comes and tells me that he got a woman pregnant, I listen. I try to help him have peace and little by little I try to help him realize that the natural law takes priority over his priesthood. So, he has to leave the ministry and should take care of that child, even if he chooses not to marry that woman. For just as that child has the right to have a mother, he has a right to the face of a father. I commit myself to arranging all the paperwork for him in Rome, but he has to leave everything. Now, if a priest tells me he got excited and that he had a fall, I help him to get on track again. There are priests who get on track again and others who do not. Some, unfortunately, do not even tell the bishop.

Skorka: What does it mean to get back on track?

Bergoglio: To do penance, to keep their celibacy. The double life is no good for us. I don’t like it because it means building on falsehood. Sometimes I say: “If you can not overcome it, make your decision.”

Skorka: I would like to clarify that a priest who falls in love with a girl and then confesses is one thing, and a case of pedophilia is quite another. Pedophilia has to be cut off at the roots. It’s very serious. Two adults who love each other having an affair is something else.

Bergoglio: The idea that pedophilia is a consequence of celibacy is ruled out. More than seventy percent of cases of pedophilia occur in the family and neighborhood: grandparents, uncles, stepfathers, neighbors. The problem is not linked to celibacy. If a priest is a pedophile, he is so before he is a priest.

Now, when that happens, we must never turn a blind eye. You cannot be in a position of power and destroy the life of another person. In the diocese it never happened to me, but a bishop once called me to ask me by phone what to do in a situation like that and I told him to take away the priests’ licenses, not to allow them to exercise the priesthood any more, and to begin a canonical trial in that diocese’s court. I think that’s the attitude to have. I do not believe in taking positions that uphold a certain corporative spirit in order to avoid damaging the image of the institution. That solution was proposed once in the United States: they proposed switching the priests to a different parish. It is a stupid idea; that way, the priest just takes the problem with him wherever he goes. The corporate reaction leads to such a result, so I do not agree with those solutions. Recently, there were cases uncovered in Ireland from about twenty years ago, and the present Pope [Benedict XVI] clearly said: “Zero tolerance for that crime.” I admire the courage and uprightness of Pope Benedict on the subject.

 

[Cider]

I titled this poorly…

But anyways does it seem like he is willing to discuss the discipline?

Well you used the title of the article you cited in the OP which is what we are supposed to do when starting a thread in the news forums. The news organization is who chose the title.

 

[Cider]

My only complaint with the article is that they cited the National “catholic” Reporter, a dissident paper that has been requested by their bishop to no longer use the term catholic.

Not sure what is so controversial about the rest, other than it doesn’t clearly explain the differences between disciplines and doctrines and so those some people will be confused and think that everything is up for grabs.

Priestly celibacy can be changed, I don’t think it will be, and I’m certainly not advocating it but I didn’t notice any blatant misinformation in the article.

 

[TimSpalding]

It looks like NBC cherry-picked quotes from the original 2012 interview to try to make it look like he is thinking about changing the discipline. Here is the original interview with the comments in context.

Weren’t we all reading from that anyway? It was THE FIRST LINK in the NBC piece, even if it hadn’t been making the rounds of the Catholic blogophere.

 

[DlandFan06]

I think it would be too much of a headache if they allowed for priests to marry. For one, would the parish have to support the priest’s wife and kids if he had any? What about if the wife works for a company that doesn’t have the same philosophies as the Church? How would that go down?

Further, what about married bishops, Archbishops or Cardinals? A married Pope? There would be a lot of political problems with this. Look how much headache children of heads of state give their parents. What if one the Pope’s kids embarrasses the Pope or supports a cause that’s in conflict with the Church or the Pope’s teachings? What about a Papal annulment or if one of the Cardinals was related to the Pope like a grandchild or great-grandchild?

Too much of a headache I think.

 

[october_baby]

The article seemed inoffensive, but I think it’s a progressive pipe dream to overturn a thousand years of catholic tradition.

 

[Elizabeth502]

I think it would be too much of a headache if they allowed for priests to marry. For one, would the parish have to support the priest’s wife and kids if he had any? What about if the wife works for a company that doesn’t have the same philosophies as the Church? How would that go down?

Further, what about married bishops, Archbishops or Cardinals? A married Pope? There would be a lot of political problems with this. Look how much headache children of heads of state give their parents. What if one the Pope’s kids embarrasses the Pope or supports a cause that’s in conflict with the Church or the Pope’s teachings? What about a Papal annulment or if one of the Cardinals was related to the Pope like a grandchild or great-grandchild?

(1) Bishops and above would not be allowed to marry. That’s been made clear.

(2) The wife’s place of work is a non-issue. No faithful priest would marry a woman who could not make a choice not to work for a morally controversial company. It would be a similar pattern as has been true for wives of ministers and rabbis: the wife understands that she is subject to scrutiny and must never embarrass or compromise her husband’s position.

Nevertheless, it would have helped if you would have listened to Colin Donovan this week (EWTN VP of Moral Theology) discuss differences in formal & material cooperation, including remote. He knows his stuff cold, and is very orthodox, and even he said that it’s impossible for the entire Catholic population to be working only for morally “pure” companies. Ain’t going to happen. Somewhere up the food chain (of too many companies) exists some policy which opposes Catholic teaching.

However, your premise also assumes, as I said, that the wife would supposedly have no choice in where to work, for whom to work. She might be self-employed as an attorney, wihtout controversy; she might work at a Catholic bookstore or for the diocese. Etc. All kinds of possibilities there.

(3) The two valid issues are, and have always been, the priest’s divided attention and the financial status of the supporting parish. That’s why I’ve said elsewhere that pragmatism would definitely affect whatever universal options were available. It would be an option with a clause in there: such priests with families would not get assigned to understaffed parishes (i.e., the only priest), and such families would have to have a solid financial base, meaning that either the wife earns a very healthy income, and/or the parish coffers are in the black and then some.

If tomorrow, Pope Francis said, “optional celibacy everywhere; all you married men interested in the priesthood, come and apply,” it would not mean that even most of the parishes just in the U.S. (for example) would have a married priest on site at the end of those seminary training periods. That is just entirely unrealistic, in my view. It would very much depend on the circumstances of the priest’s own household situation and the parish situation. At least initially it would be tentatively tried on a cautious and experimental level, i.m.o., with such priests being considered supplemental to the celibate priest(s) already on staff.

 

[Dakota_Roberts]

I think it would be too much of a headache if they allowed for priests to marry. For one, would the parish have to support the priest’s wife and kids if he had any? What about if the wife works for a company that doesn’t have the same philosophies as the Church? How would that go down?

Further, what about married bishops, Archbishops or Cardinals? A married Pope? There would be a lot of political problems with this. Look how much headache children of heads of state give their parents. What if one the Pope’s kids embarrasses the Pope or supports a cause that’s in conflict with the Church or the Pope’s teachings? What about a Papal annulment or if one of the Cardinals was related to the Pope like a grandchild or great-grandchild?

Too much of a headache I think.

The Church will never have married bishops.

 

[pepipop]

(1) Bishops and above would not be allowed to marry. That’s been made clear.

(2) The wife’s place of work is a non-issue. No faithful priest would marry a woman who could not make a choice not to work for a morally controversial company. It would be a similar pattern as has been true for wives of ministers and rabbis: the wife understands that she is subject to scrutiny and must never embarrass or compromise her husband’s position.

Nevertheless, it would have helped if you would have listened to Colin Donovan this week (EWTN VP of Moral Theology) discuss differences in formal & material cooperation, including remote. He knows his stuff cold, and is very orthodox, and even he said that it’s impossible for the entire Catholic population to be working only for morally “pure” companies. Ain’t going to happen. Somewhere up the food chain (of too many companies) exists some policy which opposes Catholic teaching.

However, your premise also assumes, as I said, that the wife would supposedly have no choice in where to work, for whom to work. She might be self-employed as an attorney, wihtout controversy; she might work at a Catholic bookstore or for the diocese. Etc. All kinds of possibilities there.

(3) The two valid issues are, and have always been, the priest’s divided attention and the financial status of the supporting parish. That’s why I’ve said elsewhere that pragmatism would definitely affect whatever universal options were available. It would be an option with a clause in there: such priests with families would not get assigned to understaffed parishes (i.e., the only priest), and such families would have to have a solid financial base, meaning that either the wife earns a very healthy income, and/or the parish coffers are in the black and then some.

If tomorrow, Pope Francis said, “optional celibacy everywhere; all you married men interested in the priesthood, come and apply,” it would not mean that even most of the parishes just in the U.S. (for example) would have a married priest on site at the end of those seminary training periods. That is just entirely unrealistic, in my view. It would very much depend on the circumstances of the priest’s own household situation and the parish situation. At least initially it would be tentatively tried on a cautious and experimental level, i.m.o., with such priests being considered supplemental to the celibate priest(s) already on staff.

This still would not address problems if the wife wished to leave her husband, get a divorce and she possibly may also wish to leave the church. If all priests could marry problems of divorce/annulment, alimony and who gets custody of the children would enter the church - an open door for the secular media to have a field day against the church and her teachings.

 

[Elizabeth502]

This still would not address problems if the wife wished to leave her husband, get a divorce and she possibly may also wish to leave the church. If all priests could marry problems of divorce/annulment, alimony and who gets custody of the children would enter the church - an open door for the secular media to have a field day against the church and her teachings.

I addressed this on a much earlier post I made somewhere on CAF, on this subject. One of the many conditions (I mentioned that each case would have many conditions on it) would be an already stable marriage, which would probably eliminate the newly married. It takes time to adjust to marriage and to handle successfully disagreements and even crises which arise. Practically speaking (and including the issue of money which I also brought up) it means older married priests, because the wife would be then much more free to work without constant oversight of young children, there might even be some children out of the house by that time and financially independent. That is, this is only my guess as to which kinds of situations would first be entertained by the Church, for any individual parish.

It’s absurd just to dismiss the option as unmanageable. Selectively, it would be manageable, and it’s not necessary to bring up extreme improbabilities. To the extent that a particular married priest would encounter a marriage or divorce crisis, probably the church would put that priest on temporary leave, first of all (which is the Church’s habit), until the crisis resolved, iif it was resolvable. If there was some inevitable separation of the couple, then, depending on the situation, his working hours, or even his assignment, would have to be altered to account for that unlikely scenario.

Thousands of rabbis and Protestant pastors manage both their congregations and their families, most of them without the kinds of crises which affect those congregations in any extreme way.

 

[Gricken]

Keep in mind that Celibate priests isn’t doctrine. It’s a discipline. Far as I know though, there hasn’t been any discussion about changing that discipline. I suppose they are free to if they wish. Can’t say I think it’s a good idea though.

 

[pepipop]

I addressed this on a much earlier post I made somewhere on CAF, on this subject. One of the many conditions (I mentioned that each case would have many conditions on it) would be an already stable marriage, which would probably eliminate the newly married. It takes time to adjust to marriage and to handle successfully disagreements and even crises which arise. Practically speaking (and including the issue of money which I also brought up) it means older married priests, because the wife would be then much more free to work without constant oversight of young children, there might even be some children out of the house by that time and financially independent. That is, this is only my guess as to which kinds of situations would first be entertained by the Church, for any individual parish.

It’s absurd just to dismiss the option as unmanageable. Selectively, it would be manageable, and it’s not necessary to bring up extreme improbabilities. To the extent that a particular married priest would encounter a marriage or divorce crisis, probably the church would put that priest on temporary leave, first of all (which is the Church’s habit), until the crisis resolved, iif it was resolvable. If there was some inevitable separation of the couple, then, depending on the situation, his working hours, or even his assignment, would have to be altered to account for that unlikely scenario.

Thousands of rabbis and Protestant pastors manage both their congregations and their families, most of them without the kinds of crises which affect those congregations in any extreme way.

My apologies, I thought you were referring to newly ordained and/or Catholic priests being allowed to marry - I assume you are referring to already married men that then enter the church. Obviously, if these marriages go astray there is less inference on the church itself, as I assume they shall be transferring from another religious denomination and will no doubt be in mature marriages, anyhow, at that time of their transferal. Orr, possibly you mean already married catholic men becoming priests? That would seem to be a difficult way to enter the church, as I can only assume the man would have to do at least three years or more years of training/theological study, with no income, during the training/learning period.

 

[Tobias22]

I addressed this on a much earlier post I made somewhere on CAF, on this subject. One of the many conditions (I mentioned that each case would have many conditions on it) would be an already stable marriage, which would probably eliminate the newly married. It takes time to adjust to marriage and to handle successfully disagreements and even crises which arise. Practically speaking (and including the issue of money which I also brought up) it means older married priests, because the wife would be then much more free to work without constant oversight of young children, there might even be some children out of the house by that time and financially independent. That is, this is only my guess as to which kinds of situations would first be entertained by the Church, for any individual parish.

It’s absurd just to dismiss the option as unmanageable. Selectively, it would be manageable, and it’s not necessary to bring up extreme improbabilities. To the extent that a particular married priest would encounter a marriage or divorce crisis, probably the church would put that priest on temporary leave, first of all (which is the Church’s habit), until the crisis resolved, iif it was resolvable. If there was some inevitable separation of the couple, then, depending on the situation, his working hours, or even his assignment, would have to be altered to account for that unlikely scenario.

Thousands of rabbis and Protestant pastors manage both their congregations and their families, most of them without the kinds of crises which affect those congregations in any extreme way.

Some of the priests in my area are assuming that discussion at least will be opened up on ending the celibacy requirement. I think that is a good bet. As to actually changing it that is not as likely but could happen. it seems many priests and bishops in the West are open to it.

 

[DlandFan06]

(1) Bishops and above would not be allowed to marry. That’s been made clear.

(2) The wife’s place of work is a non-issue. No faithful priest would marry a woman who could not make a choice not to work for a morally controversial company. It would be a similar pattern as has been true for wives of ministers and rabbis: the wife understands that she is subject to scrutiny and must never embarrass or compromise her husband’s position.

Nevertheless, it would have helped if you would have listened to Colin Donovan this week (EWTN VP of Moral Theology) discuss differences in formal & material cooperation, including remote. He knows his stuff cold, and is very orthodox, and even he said that it’s impossible for the entire Catholic population to be working only for morally “pure” companies. Ain’t going to happen. Somewhere up the food chain (of too many companies) exists some policy which opposes Catholic teaching.

However, your premise also assumes, as I said, that the wife would supposedly have no choice in where to work, for whom to work. She might be self-employed as an attorney, wihtout controversy; she might work at a Catholic bookstore or for the diocese. Etc. All kinds of possibilities there.

(3) The two valid issues are, and have always been, the priest’s divided attention and the financial status of the supporting parish. That’s why I’ve said elsewhere that pragmatism would definitely affect whatever universal options were available. It would be an option with a clause in there: such priests with families would not get assigned to understaffed parishes (i.e., the only priest), and such families would have to have a solid financial base, meaning that either the wife earns a very healthy income, and/or the parish coffers are in the black and then some.

If tomorrow, Pope Francis said, “optional celibacy everywhere; all you married men interested in the priesthood, come and apply,” it would not mean that even most of the parishes just in the U.S. (for example) would have a married priest on site at the end of those seminary training periods. That is just entirely unrealistic, in my view. It would very much depend on the circumstances of the priest’s own household situation and the parish situation. At least initially it would be tentatively tried on a cautious and experimental level, i.m.o., with such priests being considered supplemental to the celibate priest(s) already on staff.

Well if Bishops, Archbishops, and Popes can’t be married and priests can then how will priests be promoted to a higher office? Unless there are quotas as to how many priests can marry.

So far as the workplace for the wife, I hope that the wife has enough smarts to not work for something that’s for gay marriage or abortion. If you look at politics and how many spouses have dabbled in things that were shady or questionable, if would be a field day for the media to find out that a priests wife is involved in some kind of job or capacity in which a company or government office promotes something that’s against Church teaching.

I would just think that if the media found out about what the wife was doing, whether she was innocent or not, that there would be a field day. Another concern would be the problem of supporting the priests wife and kids and how the media would perceive it. It could add to the myth of Catholic extravagance and could be spun to say “look, the priests and kids are living on the parishioners dime.” Although that might not be the case.

 

[TimSpalding]

Well if Bishops, Archbishops, and Popes can’t be married and priests can then how will priests be promoted to a higher office? Unless there are quotas as to how many priests can marry.

So far as the workplace for the wife…

I would just think that if the media found out about what the wife was doing…

Have you noticed a lack of Orthodox and other eastern bishops? Have you found the wives of the wives of Orthodox and Protestant priests and ministers to present scandal after scandal? The eastern churches—and eastern Catholics, of course—have gotten along with this for 2,000 years. It is the normal state of hundreds of millions of Christians worldwide, in societies from Russia to Ethiopia, including two million in the US—societies that, I add, have been more successful at holding off secularism far better than the West. And obviously this is the normal state for most Protestants now.

You forgot children. What will we DO if a Catholic priest’s son is caught wearing a marriage equality shirt? Maybe I’m optimistic, but I think the world will keep spinning just fine.