Good thing, these fellas desperately need some "handlin':"
Posted on 05/25/2005 10:35:49 PM PDT by sinkspur
THE leader of Scotland's Catholics has risked reigniting a row over married priests by predicting the Vatican will eventually relent and allow the practice.
Cardinal Keith O'Brien, the Archbishop of St Andrews and Edinburgh, said the success of married deacons in the church means the change is likely.
The church leader has upset traditional Catholics in the past with his views on celibacy, homosexuality and the priesthood.
His latest comments were made in an interview with the Catholic Times, which will be published on Sunday,
Asked if he believed married priests will become a reality, he said: "Having seen something of the apostolate of married deacons, I can foresee the day when there will be married priests."
The Cardinal has angered conservative Catholics in the past with his acceptance of gay priests, as long as they remained celibate.
However, since being elevated to the College of Cardinals he has espoused views more in line with Vatican teachings. Cardinal O'Brien's latest comments drew criticism from the right-wing Catholic Truth movement.
A spokesman for the group said: "He is trying to say that he is not necessarily personally in favour of this but we can debate it. It's a sleekit way of trying to have his cake and eat it."
However, a poll of 80 Catholic priests in Scotland conducted only last month suggested 40 per cent believed they should be allowed to marry, but the issue remains thorny to many conservative Catholics.
Cardinal O'Brien gained a reputation as a liberal after he said in 2002, before he became a cardinal, that he saw no end to theological argument against celibacy within the priesthood.
A day later he issued a joint statement with Mario Conti, the archbishop of Glasgow, in which the pair said: "While no-one would suggest clerical celibacy is an unchangeable discipline, we believe it has an enormous value."
The following year he risked angering conservatives again when he broached the subject of married priests.
He said in a thanksgiving mass that the church should have "at every level" a discussion about clerical celibacy.
He said the argument for married priests was supported by the case of married Anglican priests who have converted to Catholicism and been allowed to continue their ministries.
However, at the ecclesiastical senate in Rome in October 2003, he made a statement at the end of the Nicene Creed in which he affirmed support of the church's teachings on celibacy, contraception and homosexuality.
It was claimed at the time, but denied, that the added words were said under pressure from the Vatican.
Since then the Cardinal has been careful not to speak out on any of the issues that caused so much controversy.
A spokesman for the Church said today that the Cardinal's comments were not incompatible with his profession of faith in 2003.
He said: "It is a neutral comment on the issue, it is neither a ringing endorsement of the concept, neither is it an outright denunciation."
My mom LOVES that song.
Credit goes wholly to cyborg! Hilarious.
Oh yeah, I hope he jumps in if he's around. He's brilliant!
GOOD. I'll keep the window to this thread OPEN.
Good thing, these fellas desperately need some "handlin':"
LOL!!
Hey, have you noticed that our mosquitoes seem to have fled?
LOL Petronski has some serious juju.
Now, now, let's save our best for later. LMYKWO just recalling that great post of yours to that smug, nasty poster. Haven't seen her around much either! LOL!
JP the exterminator.
NOW who's gonna handle muh boys:
It's even funnier to hear her say it. LOL
Spoken like a man in love.
LOL! If mockery can make the devil flee, these chuckleheads had no chance.
You will not see a competent Protestant poster here, because with competence, a knowledge of the limitations of Protestant theology, and good manners often come. Their group survival strategy (conscious or not) employed here is not to win arguments but to generate enough irritation so that a myth of us treating Protestants badly can be sustained.
hehe!
Yes, I can see how they are trying to do that. And I believe wholeheartedly in answering their arguments. The thing that got me about this thread is that it had absolutely nothing to do with them. At first, Catholics on this thread answered their questions/accusations, but is was as if they had their fingers in their ears going, "nah, nah, nah, I'm not listening!" I guess that was when I lost all patience and started calling them peasants. But compared to their condemnations that we're all going to hell, I think our (admittedly somewhat arrogant) mockery was much more moderate.
Annalex: Your Faith is admirable. Your patience awe-inspiring. Some of us cannot muster as much cghairty as you do.
Everyone else: Apparently all it took was for me to let #1 daughter use computer for half an hour (i.e. for me to shut up for half an hour) to bring about helter-skelter retreat of the usual gang of suspects. High fives! I am taking #3 daughter to he softball game. Imagine what can be done over three hours or so!
LOL
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