THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, PRIESTLY CELIBACY, AND GAY MARRIAGE
The Roman Catholic Church’s ban on married heterosexual priests has been, is, and will be self-destructive. It is also without any meritorious religious basis. Most of the original 12 Jewish disciples of the Rabbi Jesus were married men. Married Priests were common for over a thousand years in the Church. This celibacy requirement is only about a couple hundred years old. A number of past Popes were married and at least one Pope was the father of another.
Most of the world’s religions find their best recruits for the next generation of spiritual leaders among the children of married Rabbis, Ministers, and Imams. This leaves the Catholic Church with about 1 billion worldwide adherents at a considerable disadvantage.
If a married Episcopal or Anglican Priest leaves that church and becomes a Catholic Priest, he can stay married. The Roman Catholic Church is also in “full communion” with various Eastern Sects (Ukrainian, Armenian, etc.) that permit their priests to marry. The Episcopal and Anglican churches are having a major schism over women and gay priests, but there is no conflict over heterosexual married men as Priests.
Father Alberto Cutie, the Roman Catholic “Latino” TV Priest in Miami fell from grace when he admitted to having fallen in love with a woman (a young boy would have been more predictable but it was a relief to many Catholics anyway). He has decided to become an Episcopalian in order to get married. In protest to the ordination of women and openly gay men as Priests, some married Episcopalian Priests have joined the Catholic Church and all have been allowed to stay married. With a name like Cutie, it wouldn’t be a surprise if he tries to pull a stunt like that. He might be betting that it would take years for the old guys in Rome to figure that one out.
It is unlikely that the Church will be able to engage science and technology to invent a robot or hologram priest that only comes into view during the middle of mass to bless the wine and bread and then promptly disappears. It would also have to make the necessary guest appearances at weddings, funerals, and for last rites.
Even though the Catholic laity has grown significantly over the past 50 years, the number of Priests has dropped precipitously during the same period of time. Where there were once 3 Priests to a parish, many parishes today have to get by with only one full-time or one part-time priest who may also handle another parish or two. After the sexual scandals of the Catholic church were exposed, many problemmatic Priests had to retire or be assigned to administrative tasks far from parishoners and children.
The huge shortage of Priests is the principle reason behind the needless closure of so many catholic churches in the East and Midwest of the United States, and elsewhere in Canada and Europe. More than just killing off important social and charitable centers for entire neighborhoods, the Church is abandoning it flock and many important architectural and artistic treasures of U.S. urban history.
Without a Minister or Rabbi, most Protestant Churches and Jewish Congregations would flounder and die. The same holds true for Catholic communities. Every religion needs local spiritual and organizational leaders – and one in a far-off city is not going to be sufficient for the long-term growth and continuity of any religious group. Even new immigrant Catholics cannot make up for the continuing losses in the Church’s real membership or Priesthood – and many of those immigrants also support a married priesthood. Many “lapsed” Catholics failed to find a competent Priest to be their spiritual guides and they turned elsewhere for important answers.
Instead the Church has had to scramble for priests from the ever-shrinking group of men not interested in marriage. With gays eventually getting the right to marry – that group of interested men will get even smaller. It will be limited to just those men who are uninterested in having any meaningful relationships with women, men, or children – also known as “hermits.” Perhaps the Church’s strong stance against gay marriage is secretly fed by a fear of losing its last recruiting ground for Priests.
For the majority of Roman Catholics around the world who see nothing wrong with having married heterosexual men as Priests, the best route to that end may be in strongly supporting Gay marriage. By ensuring that there are effectively no celibate men available for the Priesthood, coupled with the glaring history of a non-celibate Priesthood and current policies that permit them in associated churches, the Roman Catholic Hierarchy may finally have to give in on this issue as a matter of survival.
This could be a win-win coalition between the GLBT community and the Catholic Laity. Proponents of Proposition 8 in California should present such a cogent argument to one of the largest voting blocks in the state in order to win its passage, and that would eventually have important ancillary benefits.
Of course the stubborn, ossified, narrow-minded, asexual, old men in Rome may refuse any changes until they are all dead, but then that’s just a short time to wait. However the mold would have already been cast to be poured by their successors if the Church wants to be a viable religious organization in the future.
Large and old institutions change very slowly, and in light of the mess the Anglican and Episcopalian Churches are in today, there probably won’t be any women or openly gay people admitted to the Catholic Priesthood if married heterosexual men can again become Priests. But with so many married men (including many former Priests) out there who want to be Priests, the church could be reinvigorated for generations to come by taking just this small step. And over time, understanding, benevolent, and inclusive-minded heterosexual married Priests with wives and children may lead to further changes in just a generation or two.
By Marc Pascal in Phoenix, AZ whose family and friends are mainly Catholic and Jewish. He fully supports gay civil unions or marriage on a civil rights basis. He sincerely hopes that in his lifetime some of his frustrated married male friends can become really great Catholic priests and pass their love of God and the Church onto their children.
16 Responses to “THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, PRIESTLY CELIBACY, AND GAY MARRIAGE”
Yes but you see…lol…
Once you start revisiting one catholic dogmatic relic, you have to revisit them all…
And then as a natural byproduct of that you will discover that catholicism is just a relic of Roman expansion retooled to please pagans' thirst for ritual, altars, blood, body and so on…keep those distant populations faithful and in line with the roman rule. What better way than to school them since knee-high and play on their fears of spiritual damnation? It starts getting really silly if you look deep enough. The hope is that you won't.
I recall learning that the main reason for priests not being able to marry was practical. The Catholic Church is the one of the largest land owners in the world and they didn't want priests to be able to bequeath any church property to their spouses or descendants, especially the spouses. The Catholic Church has still got to be one of, if not the, largest boys club in the world…heaven forbid a woman own any of that property.
Yes, that's exactly right, Sil. THE reason gay people want marriage is so they can have “access to children.” What the heck do you mean by “access to children?” Another time, I guess. But how can YOU claim to know THE reason gay people want marriage? Do you have access to all their personal wishes and desires, and have you thus discerned, by observation and interpretation, that “access to children” is THE reason?
Oops, there I go again, feeding the trolls. Dang it.
Adoption.. Right now adoption agencies have the descretion to accept or deny civil union partnerships way more than they do married couples. Once marriage “equality” is obtained for sexual deviants, then the adoption agencies will have their hands tied when it comes to their discernment [descrimination] as to applicants based the organizers of the push to normalize homosexuality do. They're the same folks that wrote and produced the on sexual preference.
Try no to play dumb, OK? People have known this is at the heart of gay marriage. Not all gays think that way but blackmail piece 'Do Ask, Do Tell”…the same folks that throw parties, advertise on teen radio stations and school campuses to attend for “bi-curious” [all adolescents are sexually curious] and so on..
Nothing is all pure and all decent. The gay marriage movement is all about what they already know: getting more chicken [gay vernacular since the 1800s for hetero boys vulnerable to conversion to homosexuality in unisex institutions like the navy was or prisons are] on the menu.. I've heard the same thing with lesbians and seen it first hand where seduction and conversion of straight girls to lesbians is the unofficial pasttime with many promiscuous lesbians.
Quite a lot of hetero people who sympathize with the gay movement may not have had a chance to witness the everyday activities of gays in an openly gay culture like the area in which I live. When they let it all hang out, the truth is not as pure as the driven snow. From the guy I know of who cruises the steets at night looking for young boys sneaking out to party [and convert once high on drugs], to the various teachers aides, women, who actively encouraged my daughter and her friends to drop any thoughts of boys, their behinds she patted and the girl in her class she lusted after..
I know of about ten lesbians, their personal history they openly [way too openly and in mixed company] brag about day and night. Eight of those ten I've known to have personally hit on underaged girls as a sport. They get bragging rights when they succeed. I know about four gay men personally. They don't speak as openly [to me anyway] about their conquests but I've seen them lusting after very young men, teens, without even thinking about it.
Homosexuality is a fetish and fetishes are based on sexual conditioning, and have nothing whatsoever to do with love. It's a meat festival out there enough as it is, even with hetero sex. To accept a fetish into the language of marriage is the final death blow to the institution. I've got a more appropriate idea, one that will come about anyway. Instead of allowing gays to marry, simply abolish the institution of marriage altogether. That is, essentially what will finally be done when all this is over with.
Homosexuality is a behavior, not an innate “minority-qualifier”. No one is being descriminated against since any male is free to marry andy female and vice versa as long as they are of age. Sexual fetishes do not a relationship make, that's why witneses and vows are involved in marriage as well as the potential to beget children between the partners.
Holy hell, Sil, this post has nothing to do with gay marriage, there's no connection. I think you have a huge deviant obsession with gay marriage and gay sex, particularly as it relates to other mammals and their doing-it proclivities. I think this deviance makes you unfit to marry. Get help. Soon.
Anyway, very interesting post. I've always found it interesting that Catholics, more than most other denominations, seem to understand the human need for release, as exemplefied in the ability to confess sins. Unlike most protestant churches, there seems to be an inherent understanding that people need a way to be absolved, to discuss their problems, to find peace with God about the poor choices they've made in the past, and to accompany that with a pinky-swear with the Big Guy himself to work on changing bad behavior. It's very interesting to me that the understanding of human nature that seems present in some of the Catholic Church's practices doesn't extend to sexual needs.
I had also heard about the property issue with respect to the prohibition. Not sufficiently interested to research it, but it's an interesting possibility.
So the Catholic Church should change because a non catholic thinks so? Not catholic but I have to respect someone who is and wants to be a good priest, I mean if it's easy then it really wouldn't be as big a deal would it?
It's very interesting to me that the understanding of human nature that seems present in some of the Catholic Church's practices doesn't extend to sexual needs.
That's an interesting analogy, roro, but it shows a lack of understanding of the Catholic teachings about sex. It's precisely because we don't think sex is meant to be a need in the sense of personal gratification (release) that this analogy ends up making no sense. Sex according to Catholic theology is meant to be a means toward intimacy with another human being, and there's also the belief that that same need can be channelled in different directions, sometimes with spiritual relations taking the place of physical ones.
On the topic of the post, it's interesting that all this speculation comes with no links or facts. It's hard for me to relate to the dioceses that are struggling in other areas of the country because ours is booming- but from what I read and hear, the issues are more directly correlated with low attendance in certain parishes (particularly inner city ones) and then the priest shortage is only factoring in because the outlying parishes need the priests far more than inner city parishes where only 150 people attend Mass. Add to that the lack of financial support, and that's why they're consolidating and closing down some of the older churches. At any rate, there's a lot more issues involved than just shortage of priests (the flock itself is shrinking in these areas) and the conclusions drawn in this post are far from clearly evident.
Sil, I think you need to meet more gay people as your neighbors don't sound at all typical. Nobody I know seeks “access to children.”
Cstanley — I wasn't necessarily trying to draw a comparison, saying that because of this thing, something else should automatically be true. I just always thought that it was interesting, and maybe I'm misreading the idea behind confession anyway, even though I know that the cathartic aspects of confession have been a great relief to many people. I do find it funny that you didn't mention “procreation” as one of the ways that the church finds sex important. I've known enough Catholics to know that this is a pretty important thing to the church.
My not mentioning procreation doesn't mean that it's not true that that's a big part of it too. The intimacy aspect serves the procreative aspect. I focuses on intimacy to draw the distinction between sex as a means to connect with another human being as opposed to objectifying another human being for one's own self gratification.
I don't think you're wrong about confession although that too is just a part of it. It's also psychologically healthy to take a formal time to reflect on our failings, and to go through the process of actually asking for forgiveness (a process which is important in our human relationships because other people need to actually hear us ask for forgiveness when we've wronged them). Plus, the sacramental aspect is that we ask for, and we believe that we receive, God's grace in order to strengthen us against committing the sins in the future.
Factually, I suppose the gays I've met who seek access to children do stand out in my mind. So yeah, I might be over-estimating their numbers within the gay population at large. And yet I hear their ads for GLBT late night parties on teen radio stations my kids listen to, inviting “bi-curious” youth to attend [and get "lucky"?]. And since I've heard no outcry, not a peep nor a whisper from any gay person about this blatant recruitment drive [all adolescents are sexually curious], I have to conclude that the gay culture willingly embraces the conversion of normally hetero adolescents to homosexuality via these “introduction parties”.
Maybe some of the more clever of their ranks have worked on AI farms and know what that industry banks on: that sexuality in pubescents is quite malleable..
Nah, I mean, the “official” gay handbook reads that homosexuality is 'genetic” and has no roots in classical conditioning from environmental influences…
Do we all go by that handbook? [munches on bacon and pours cream into coffee]…I mean, where's the proof that this is so?…lol…
As for Anna's points about the catholic church denying marriage to priests due to wanting to hold onto lands…I say bingo! That sounds right on the money…in this case, literally on the money..
Nah,
Silhouette seems to have gays confused with vampires.
It's the Roman rite of theCatholic church that doesn't allow priests to marry. There are other rites in the church that allow priests to marry including a few Anglican priests who crossed over with their wives in hand. ____
Of course, the Roman rite is by far the largest and the church has a rule that states if you are born in one rite, you can't become a member of the other. The reason for this is also historical, the popes of the 11th century didn't want the influence of the Eastern Orthodox church to sway Catholics. In fact they forced the Irish to take on the Roman rite – the Irish had a hodge-podge of Roman and Eastern rites (you can look it up in the Catholic Encyclopedia) that were done away with by fiat from Rome – but had to accept a host of European and Middle Eastern rites because their adherents were too powerful to mess with at the time.____
So it is possible for the Catholic church to have married priests, in fact they aready do. But don't hold your breath.
It's the Roman rite of the Catholic church that doesn't allow priests to marry. There are other rites in the church that allow priests to marry including a few Anglican priests who crossed over with their wives in hand.
Of course, the Roman rite is by far the largest and the church has a rule that states if you are born in one rite, you can't become a member of the other. The reason for this is also historical, the popes of the 11th century didn't want the influence of the Eastern Orthodox church to sway Catholics. In fact they forced the Irish to take on the Roman rite – the Irish had a hodge-podge of Roman and Eastern rites (you can look it up in the Catholic Encyclopedia) that were done away with by fiat from Rome – but had to accept a host of European and Middle Eastern rites because their adherents were too powerful to mess with at the time.
So it is possible for the Catholic church to have married priests, in fact they aready do. But don't hold your breath.
hyhybt — Gays ARE vampires! And bovine ones at that! Didn't you know? They are big scary bull vampires who are just waiting to get your children into their lair! Muah-ha-ha-ha! And they build houses of candy in the woods, to lure the unthinking little kiddies with their maleable sexualities! Thank Goddess we have Sil whose *friends* have let her in on their dirty evil “introduction parties”! Oogy-boogy!!!