www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall When married priests remain active in Catholic church

The thing that strikes me about this article is the stating that the Roman Rite allows married priest from other denominations. But, these men never took the vow of celibacy.

There are ways of a priest leaving the Church and getting married just as Frances McNutt did. He was laysized and he and his wife are both active in the Church and Church ministry.

This person makes the statements about Rome allowing married men to enter, but again it is vows. They never made the vows to God to remain celebate. Just as in the East, they enter the priethood married. So the fact that she is ignoring that point makes this whole thing wrong.

Another question, since they have gone against their vows are the Sacraments still valid?
Pani Rose

August 13, 2005
Fathers and Rebels
When married priests remain active in Catholic church
By ELIZABETH MEHREN
Los Angeles Times

BOSTON - The priests came from three states, converging on a suburban park one Sunday to conduct an outdoor Mass. Wearing white vestments with rainbow-hued stoles, they led the worshippers in prayer and song. They stuck closely to traditional Roman Catholic ritual.
But as they raised their arms in blessing, the five men revealed unmistakable proof of defiance: All wore wedding bands.
These men who still consider themselves Roman Catholic priests have wives, children - and unflinching commitments to their 2,000-year-old faith. As married priests, they say, they are not heretical anomalies, but instead are following a model set by priests and even popes in the earliest days of their church. They are part of a growing national network of thousands of deeply religious men who believe marriage does not compromise their ability to serve as spiritual ministers.
These married priests honor ordination as an irreversible sacrament, though the church no longer recognizes them as priests. They are solemnizing marriages - including second marriages and same-sex unions. They baptize babies. They officiate at funerals. They conduct Masses at health-care facilities and private homes.
More and more rank-and-file Catholics, whose respect for Church hierarchy was shattered by the clerical sex-abuse scandal, are accepting married priests and seeking their services.
Boston College theology professor Stephen Pope said the abuse crisis not only made Catholics question the teachings of the church, but also "the credibility of the teachers." The disaffection is so strong, Pope said, that "a lot of average Catholics today would be open to married priests because they think the priests would understand their plights more readily than a celibate priest."
About 2,500 married priests have joined an organization called Rent A Priest, which maintains a Web site, www.rentapriest.com, [rentapriest.com,] that lists the priests' services in a directory called God's Yellow Pages. Rent A Priest is run by a Massachusetts-based ministry known as CITI: Celibacy Is The Issue.
Weddings performed by married priests are legally valid. But the Vatican does not sanction the ceremonies they conduct. Boston archdiocese spokesman Terrence Donilon said the married priests have no standing within the Catholic church.
"We are the elephant in the living room," said Father Terence McDonough, a celibate priest for close to three decades before marrying 20 years ago.
"They don't talk about us," McDonough said. "But we are here."
Married priests preside at parishes in such places as Wisconsin, Michigan and Indiana. In Framingham, Mass., a CITI-sponsored worship service takes place each Sunday in a Masonic Temple. The ceremony features communion loaves baked by one of the priests, Father Ron Ingalls.
CITI founder Louise Haggett defends such gatherings - and the married priests who lead them - as "licit and valid" under 21 provisions of canon law.
Haggett, 64, launched CITI 13 years ago after church officials said no priest was available to visit her dying mother at a nursing home. Haggett, a former Catholic doctrine teacher, was perplexed. Until then, she had never heard about a priest shortage.
Vowing to learn more about priests, Haggett discovered that Pope John Paul II had approved a provision in 1980 allowing the Catholic Church in America to ordain married Protestant priests. Haggett found that about 100 married Catholic priests in the United States had converted from other denominations. Most were Episcopalians.
Father Thomas Rausch, a theology professor at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, said Rome made an exception for these married Protestants because "it was seen as a way of acknowledging the ministry of those who had lived as pastors and priests and now wanted to become Roman Catholic priests, and already had families."
Haggett also found out that priests were allowed to marry in some Eastern rite branches of Catholicism, all of which report to the Vatican, but have their own codes of canon law that do not require celibacy.
Haggett found the inconsistencies absurd: Catholic priests were required to be celibate; yet some exceptions were allowed. And if the church was suffering from a priest shortage, why not retain those who left to marry?
Haggett quit her job and poured her life savings into the organization that became her mission: recruiting married Roman Catholic priests, enabling them to follow their spiritual callings, and providing practicing Catholics with priests who could temper their counsel with real-world experience.
"Celibacy has not worked, has it?" she said. "It is really nothing but a farce. It is all about Church politics."
Mandatory celibacy was not imposed on the Roman Catholic priesthood until the 12th century. In fact, St. Peter, the first pope, was married. Theologians say as many as three dozen popes may have had wives.
Some historians say the edict in the year 1139 that required priests to remain celibate was designed to elevate priests to Christ-like status. Others say the decree stemmed from concerns that priests were leaving their property to their wives and children, not the Vatican.
But the marriage ban has not always been enforced.
"Everybody is afraid to say this," said A.W. Richard Sipe, a San Diego psychotherapist and former Benedictine monk. "There have always been married priests."
Sipe, who has written many books on sexuality and the Church, said some priests in the United States are secretly married. Outside the United States, he said some Catholic priests are married with full knowledge of their superiors.
For many U.S. Catholics, the child sex-abuse scandal - now in its third year - destroyed the notion that priests were too holy to give in to sexual pleasures. The fallout was particularly dramatic in Boston, where the scandal first unfolded.
Catholics in Boston were outraged when archdiocese leaders closed parishes and parochial schools to save money to pay off more than $100 million in abuse settlements. Boston Catholics openly berated Church officials who penalized priests for speaking out about the crisis. During the Easter season, members of a Boston-area parish that had been closed taunted archdiocese leaders by announcing plans to hire a married priest for a holiday service. Church officials hastily located an active-duty priest.
The discontent has prompted many Catholics to seek alternatives within their own religion.
"As a girl, I would not have known what to make of the term 'married priests,' " said Diane Sulser, who attended the outdoor Mass here with her husband and four of her five children. "I would have found it heretical."
Because of the abuse scandal, Sulser began attending services led by married priests - and found them "more human" than the priests she had known until then.
"These men, you really have to admire them. They are holy and they are spiritual. They have studied theology and they have dedicated their lives to God. And yet they have feelings for women," Sulser said. "I have no problem with that."
There are about 43,000 Roman Catholic priests in the United States, and about 405,000 worldwide. But the number of new priests is declining each year.
"The fact is that people are desperate for priests," said Father Thomas Reese, a Jesuit scholar at the University of Santa Clara. "And everything we see in the demographics indicates it is going to continue to get worse. Either the hierarchy has got to find a way to recruit young, celibate males to become priests, or they are going to have to change the rules."
That may be less difficult than it sounds, Reese said, because celibacy is a matter of church law, not theology.
"Laws can be changed," he said. "These married priests - these are people who really want to be priests."
http://www.record-eagle.com/2005/aug/13priest.htm
This link was on http://www.spiritdaily.com

Here is an interesting article on vows from bible.org http://www.bible.org/page.asp?page_id=291

Well, one quote off the bat says it all...

"Haggett also found out that priests were allowed to marry in some Eastern rite branches of Catholicism, all of which report to the Vatican, but have their own codes of canon law that do not require celibacy."

Nowhere, ever, were priests allowed to marry, although married men were allowed to become priests.

Gaudior, who thinks that a return to that would benefit the Catholic Church

frankly I feel that this a subject that must be left to the RC Church to sort out.

Candidates for the RC priesthood know what they are taking on - they have 6 or more years to understand that, and decide whether permanent celibacy is for them or not.

They are Celibate from Ordination to the Diaconate .

If later in life they break this promise of celibacy then they have to consider whether or not they should remain Priests - again I re-iterate they knew what they were taking on .

Once they have broken that promise they cannot remain as Priests - the RC Church does not permit them to remain in Holy Orders. They should petition for laicisation and if this is granted then strictures may be applied as to what they can do in Church life.

However the one thing that is certain is that they may not Celebrate Mass , may not marry people , may not administer the Sacraments . Yes as they have been ordained they cannot be 'un-ordained' and so in certain life threatening circumstances they may hear a death bed confession and minister to that person.

The fact that now the RC Church has admiited married Priests from other Churches actually has no bearing on this situation of the Priest who broke his promise of celibacy [ BTW it is not a vow ]

Frankly I feel that this is not a subject that we should be discussing - I am in agreement with married Priests - but in the Eastern Churches where it is traditional . At present it is not up for discussion in the Roman Church.

After all - there are plenty of RC Fora available for this topic

Anhelyna mentioned this in passing, but I would like to reinforce the point more strongly:

DIOCESAN PRIESTS DO NOT TAKE VOWS! Not vows of celibacy, and not vows of anything else.

Monastics take vows. Diocesan priests promise obedience to the Bishop - but that promise to the Bishop is not a vow. [Those who do not know what a vow is are invited to inquire.]

In most seminaries, candidates for the priesthood are required to promise celibacy - but again, that promise is not a vow. Moreover, it is obtained by force, and by a process which uncomfortably resembles extortion; either of those conditions would render a vow invalid [your friendly local Catholic marriage tribunal will confirm this; "grave force and fear" is an impediment to matrimony".]

If, therefore, the relevant authorities of the Roman Catholic Church choose to dispense a priest from celibacy without simultaneously requiring him to accept reduction to the lay state [this has been done in favor of at least one diocesan Roman Catholic priest in the USA since Vatican II to my certain knowledge] there is no necessity to "dispense" the priest from his "vow" or "commute" that "vow" - because the priest has never taken such a vow.

Incognitus the Inquisitive Inquisitor

Defination of a vow -
noun

a solemn pledge to oneself, another, or diety to do something or behave in a certain manner

a binding promise to do, give, or refrain from something

verb
render holy by religious rites

dedicate to a diety

give entirely to a specific person, activity, or cause

adjective
solemly dedicate or set apart for a high purpose

Vows
Psalm 76: 12
Make and keep vows to the LORD your God. May all present bring gifts to this awesome God,

Celibacy of the Clergy

Celibacy is the renunciation of marriage implicitly or explicitly made, for the more perfect observance of chastity, by all those who receive the Sacrament of Orders in any of the higher grades. The character of this renunciation, as we shall see, is differently understood in the Eastern and in the Western Church. Speaking, for the moment, only of Western Christendom, the candidates for orders are solemnly warned by the bishop at the beginning of the ceremony regarding the gravity of the obligation which they are incurring. He tells them:

You ought anxiously to consider again and again what sort of a burden this is which you are taking upon you of your own accord. Up to this you are free. You may still, if you choose, turn to the aims and desires of the world (licet vobis pro artitrio ad caecularia vota transire). But if you receive this order (of the subdiaconate) it will no longer be lawful to turn back from your purpose. You will be required to continue in the service of God, and with His assistance to observe chastity and to be bound for ever in the ministrations of the Altar, to serve who is to reign.

By stepping forward despite this warning, when invited to do so, and by co-operating in the rest of the ordination service, the candidate is understood to bind himself equivalently by a vow of chastity. He is henceforth unable to contract a valid marriage, and any serious transgression in the matter of this vow is not only a grievous sin in itself but incurs the additional guilt of sacrilege.
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03481a.htm

Seems to be when a man protrates on the floor before his bishop, he is making a vow. I have no problem with married priests. What I have a problem with is men who make a vow to God, something as awesome as the priesthood and fail to keep it. If they cannot make it for some reason there is a right way to do so, the above article is not the right way, at least in my mind.
I realize I am not in their shoes and it may well be that it is much easier said than done, I'm sure. Also, the fact that the article, as Guadior pointed out is an erroneous statement, tries to make it seem ok. It is in your face disobedience, I am gonna get my own way no matter what you say statement. I am sorry those actions are not of God in my mind anyway.

Pani Rose

Shlomo Lkhoolkhoon,

I agree with the others on this board that say it is purely a jurisditional issue within the Latin Church.

Many here call for respect of our Churchs' autonomy, we too must respect the autonomy of the Latin Church.

This matter is of no concern to any Eastern Catholic since it is purely a Latin Church matter.

Poosh Bashlomo Lkhoolkhoon,
Yuhannon

Dear Yuhannan,

Are you sure of that? A celibate priest in the Eastern Rite who decides to do as these priests have done would find an equally warm reception over in this organization.

Gaudior, amazed that people accept sacraments at the hands of those their Church deems unworthy to perform them

I'm not sure how all the theology is worked out about this in the East, but I know the Roman point of view. A bishop has the "fullness" of ordination and is able by his consecration to perform all of the sacraments. He may dispense some duties to his priests, such as consecrating the Eucharist, hearing confession (some sins require you go to the bishop; abortion used to be one of these), baptising, annointing of the sick, and marriage. Confirmation (chrismation) is usually reserved to the bishop, but a priest may do it with permission and at the Easter Vigil. Of course, conferring Holy Orders is reserved to the bishop, because it's seen sort of like passing on his full priestly powers to a subordinate. If the bishop says "you can't use the powers" then the priest can't do it, or it's illicit (maybe also invalid, as the priest is under orders not to). So, even though holy orders leaves an indellible mark on a man, if he is "laicized", he is then stripped of his rights to practice as a priest.

This is why if a bishop breaks communion with let's say Rome, the sacraments are still seen as valid, as the bishop holds the fullness of the priesthood, handed down from the apostles. A priest doesn't share this fullness, just a part of it. This is also why priests who are "elected" bishops, but not consecrated by OTHER bishops, are not really bishops, and the Apostolic Line is then broken at them. I think the Polish National Catholics may have a problem with this.

So far as the Church (East, West, North and South) is concerned, an essential element of a vow is that this is a promise made directly to God and authorized by the Church. The physical posture of the person making a promise has nothing to do with the matter - he or she may be lying on the floor or standing on top of a ladder.

There are, for example, a number of "religious communities" within the Catholic Church whose members do not take vows, but rather make promises. That distinction is of great importance.

I've already pointed out that a promise of celibacy is required of Roman Catholic candidates for ordination (with certain rare exceptions). Saying that this is the same as a vow does not make such a statement true.

In the broader sense, it is accurate enough to say that I may make a vow to anybody to do anything - even quite trivial matters, and even sinful matters. But that is not how the Church uses the word. The Church restricts our natural right to make vows in several important ways, and a vow made in the context of the Church can be made only to God.

By the way, I am not in the least arguing that the Roman Catholics should or should not have a wider use of the ordination of married me, and still less am I arguing that the Roman Catholics should or should not permit priests who have been ordained as celibates should be permitted to go on functioning if they subsequently get married. I am only asking - even pleading - that a word like "vow" be used as the Church uses that word. Misusing the term "vow" creates serious confusion.

Incognitus

Pani Rose

I repeat , as someone who was very recently at a Latin Diaconate Ordination, The Candidates for ordination do not make a vow of celibacy , they make a promise . Whether or not they are lying prostrate or not has no bearing on this.

I did in fact discuss this matter with Deacon Gerald some time ago - when a Deacon from his College was in fact returned to the laity . I was told that though in the past as you quote from
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03481a.htm ..........

this was in fact written when the RC Church did ordain to the minor orders - they no longer do.

A candidate for Ordination in the UK [ I know it's different in the USA ] has gone through a minimum of 5 years in Seminary where the issue of celibacy is taken very very seriously and certainly in our Rome College, each student spends some time in retreat reflecting on this very subject , each year .

I quote a little from the actual Ordination Booklet that was used

I quote from the Rite of Ordination which was used on 17 April in the Pontifical Scots College in Rome.

Calling and presentation of the candidates - The Candidates are called forward by the deacon and presented for ordination to His Grace ..... by the Very Reverend Father ..... [ the Rector of the College ]

Election by the Bishop and Consent of the People

Homily -- all sit while the Archbishop gives the homily
He speaks to the people and to the candidates about the office of deacon and the meaning of celibacy in the Church.

Commitment to celibacy - In imitation of Jesus Christ the candidates freely commit themselves to lifelong celibacy for the sake of the kingdom of God. Thus they will serve the Church more freely , and give witness that God must be loved above all else and that it is He Who is served in others.

Promise of obedience - the candidates go to the Archbishop in turn and, kneeling before him , place their joined hands between his and promise respect and obedience to him and his successors.

Invitation to Prayer

As it is Eastertide , all remain standing while the candidates prostrate themselves as a sign of humility.

Nowhere in the Rite of Ordination do they take a vow of celibacy.

A promise is not necessarily a vow -I'm with Incognitus on this

Having said that - the thought of Priests for Rent does make me go very very pale .

Anhelyna

OK I give!

I guess I have no idea of what I am talking about - thanks!

Dear Friends,

On the subject of married priests and the Latin Church, yes, this is a matter for the Latin Church to contend with.

But we Easterners have as much right to praise the benefits of a married priesthood for the Latin Church as the Latin Church has had, and often still does have, the need to tell our EC Churches of the way in which celibacy is somehow an integral part of the priestly vocation.

We've always been told this and it's time we told back.

But, really, are Latin Catholics forever going to have their heads buried in the sand over this matter?

Do they not see what is happening to their Church?

I see how large the "Extra Eucharistic Minister" section of our Catholic bookstore has grown . . .

It seems that there is less alarm caused in the Latin Church over lack of priests and priests who get into trouble than over the very idea of a . . . married priest . . . shhhh!

And I just love getting lectured about the benefits of enforced priestly celibacy by married Latin traditionalists . . . really . . .

Alex

Of course, priestly celibacy in the Latin Church is enforced because it is, obviously, a rule of discipline!

And we hold this discipline of priestly celibacy very dear!

That is how we winnow the chaff from the grain.

Amado

Dear Amado,

I hate to say it . . . but in some of your dioceses, the chaff seems to be winning . . .

Alex

Dear Alex:

Where? Which ones? :p

But here in the Chicago Archdiocese, the grains might be slightly ahead!

Amado