Posted on 05/29/2010 4:19:59 PM PDT by markomalley
My thoughts?
I think that Jimmy puts this whole sordid thing in the proper context.
Well, since they are carrying on a lie and have encouraged a man in a position of representing God to lie and to commit fornication I hardly see where they consider celibacy the problem.
As for the mistresses, grow a spine, B! He's not available, won't be available, and I have NO sympathy for you. Find someone who is!
Adhering to the practice of celibacy is the issue.
Choosing a profession that has mandates one has no desire to uphold is no reason to change the profession.
Barrack Obama wants to be president without the responsibility.
In his case should we change the mandate or the man?
Well,, if they can cheat,, must not be much of a sin,,, thanks for the inspiration priests!
Shocking! I expected boys.
These women may be fooling themselves as much as anything. Let Benedict tell the priests involved they are free to marry and see how many run to marry their mistresses.
While the sacrificial unmarried life is certainly Biblical, it is distinctly stated to be a gift, (1Cor. 7:7) and is not even inferred elsewhere that all pastors were required be celibate, including in the ordination instructions. (1Tim. 3) What may be open to interpretation is whether the requirement that a bishop “be the husband of one wife” can allow normal pastors (versus traveling evangelists as Paul) to be single/celibate, which i think it does. Celibate Paul and Barnabas were exceptions in contrast to the other apostles, including Peter, and the brethren of the Lord. (1Cor. 9:5)’
Regardless of the degree of efficacy of being single - and Paul’s words in 7:26-31 may additionally be seen as preparing them for the coming 70 A.D. destruction and persecutions - to actually require that almost all head pastors have the gift of celibacy is unwarranted.. While pastoral celibacy is “only” a church law, it is still law, and is another example of doctrine that lacks Scriptural warrant, and i see this one also running contrary to it.
What is the source for your “facts”?
celibacy is not church doctrine: it is church discipline.
So it could be changed. Indeed, Eastern Catholic churches allow married men to become priests.
But there are reasons to suggest not marrying will allow a person to dedicate themselves purely to God’s work (Pauls’ dictum). And this is scriptural...
Orthodox churches ordain married men but do not allow their priest to marry, but many good Orthodox priests decide to remain single, so they can pray more and serve the Lord without the burden of caring for a family.
There are pros and cons, but ironically, although married men being ordained doesn’t bother me a bit, I do wonder about those pushing for priests to marry: Often they are the same ones who want gay marriage and womenpriests and dispute the holiness of the sacraments.
Be nice, Rich…
What foolish women. Do they really think these men would marry them? These ladies are no better than anyone who would sleep with a married man.
Not a requirement at all. Paul counseled Timothy that if he were to choose a married man as a Bishop that said man could have been married only once not that he must be married.
"It behoveth therefore a bishop to be blameless, the husband of one wife, sober, prudent, of good behaviour, chaste, given to hospitality, a teacher," 1 Timothy 3:2
"Of one wife. The meaning is not that every bishop should have a wife (for St. Paul himself had none) but that no one should be admitted to the holy orders of bishop, priest, or deacon, who had been married more than once." St. Jerome commentary on 1 Timothy 3:2
Celibate Paul and Barnabas were exceptions in contrast to the other apostles, including Peter, and the brethren of the Lord. (1Cor. 9:5)
You're making an assumption; we only know for certain from Scripture that Peter had at one time been married, and relying on a corrupted text in an attempt to make your argument only yields a corrupted argument.
"Have we not power to carry about a woman, a sister, as well as the rest of the apostles, and the brethren of the Lord, and Cephas?" 1 Corinthians 9:5
"A woman, a sister. Some erroneous translators have corrupted this text by rendering it a sister, a wife: whereas it is certain that St. Paul had no wife (chap. 7, ver 7, 8) and that he only speaks of such devout women as, according to the custom of the Jewish nation, waited upon the preachers of the gospel and supplied them with necessaries." St.Jerome commentary on 1 Corinthians 9:5
While pastoral celibacy is “only” a church law, it is still law, and is another example of doctrine that lacks Scriptural warrant, and i see this one also running contrary to it.
Celibacy is a discipline not a law or doctrine and it is indeed based on Scripture, despite your claim to the contrary.
"Who said to them: All men take not this word, but they to whom it is given. For there are eunuchs, who were born so from their mother's womb: and there are eunuchs, who were made so by men: and there are eunuchs, who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven. He that can take, let him take it." Matthew 19:11-12
"Then Peter answering, said to him: Behold we have left all things, and have followed thee: what therefore shall we have? And Jesus said to them: Amen, I say to you, that you, who have followed Me, in the regeneration, when the Son of Man shall sit on the seat of His majesty, you also shall sit on twelve seats judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And every one that hath left house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands for my name's sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall possess life everlasting. And many that are first, shall be last: and the last shall be first." Matthew 19:27-30
"Then Peter said: Behold, we have left all things, and have followed thee. Who said to them: Amen, I say to you, there is no man that hath left house, or parents, or brethren, or wife, or children, for the kingdom of God's sake, Who shall not receive much more in this present time, and in the world to come life everlasting." Luke 18:28-30
"But I would have you to be without solicitude. He that is without a wife, is solicitous for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please God. But he that is with a wife, is solicitous for the things of the world, how he may please his wife: and he is divided. And the unmarried woman and the virgin thinketh on the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit. But she that is married thinketh on the things of the world, how she may please her husband. And this I speak for your profit: not to cast a snare upon you; but for that which is decent, and which may give you power to attend upon the Lord, without impediment." 1 Corinthians 7:32-35
The question you should be pondering is not why Priests in the Latin Rite voluntary embrace the discipline of celibacy by vow in following the example set by Christ, the Apostles and St. Paul but why don't other "Bible believing" pastors do the same.
Those are assertions from a women with an admitted agenda not facts.
&&&
I agree, but I would like to add that for strumpets such as these, there is often the thrill of getting away with something wrong. Therefore, they are not interested in finding an eligible man.
Not that there's nothing wrong with hugging. Women should never hug a priest.
It's just that it's so common, they do it in public, with ten women at a time. Even laymen get hugged--by the woman usher, or at the sign of peace, or after Communion if you're sick in hospital, or if you say you need to see a priest, or...really, there's no getting around it.
As for 1Cor. 9:5, this interpretation is the least warranted. Despite Jerome's (and Challoner's) assertion that a scribe rendered it "a sister, a wife" (gunē: women or wife), and which latter word the NAB uses, basing his objection upon the fact that Paul had no wife, that is exactly the point Paul is making, that of contrasting himself with the other apostles. It makes no sense otherwise, as Paul himself received the kind of aid your have these women giving simply as sisters, (Rm. 16:2; Phil. 4:3) and "leading about (or surrounding) a sister/women" is far more descriptive of a wife.
As for leaving all, that is true that they did, at least for a time, as singleness was very rare in the world then, and it is hardly tenable to suppose that Jesus was requiring His married disciples to permanently leave wives and children.
Thus you would have to have single apostles, or married ones who left wives and most most likely children, but never went back to them, or they divorced themselves or died, all of which are the most unwarranted. Rather, 1Cor. 9:5 contrasts Paul and Barnabas as being unlike the apostles who led about a believing women, a wife, while Jesus, (Lk. 8:1-3) Paul and the apostles all had women who followed them as fellow helpers to the truth.
In addition, the Jews sometimes called their wives "sisters", (Song. 4:9) and according to Clement of Alexandria (Stromata, III, vi, ed. Dindorf, II, 276), Peter had children, and he relates the tradition that Peter's wife suffered martyrdom (ibid., VII, xi ed. cit., III, 306). See also Eusebius (Church History III.31) Philip the Evangelist also had four daughters, Act_21:8.
This warranted interpretation answers your last question, but it is not meant to slight the viability of celibacy. Also. those who literally do "leave all" are and will be indeed specially blessed if they believe and follow Christ, and it does indeed have its virtues, as sacrificing anything does. But this is not required of all to be used mightily of God, and when Lk. 14:33 requires forsaking this to be a disciple, that is best understood as being of the heart, and then if it be God' will, resulting in literally all, as many disciples had homes, etc.
Of course, they must be married before they are ordained, and if they become widowed they cannot remarry. And in order to become a Bishop in the East, one must be celibate, but by that age the passions begin to weaken, and most of the bishops come from monastic ranks anyway.
Latin priests who have mistresses are fooling around after they received their holy orders, which means they are in grave danger spiritually, but they do it because they are human and have no other outlet, except even greater abomination, and because the temptation in the society today is even greater than at any time before.
Some Latin priests and bishops have been fornicating in the past, as they do today and, no doubt will do tomorrow. Pope Alexander VI not only had children of his own, but even claimed them! One of his sons was made a cardinal under his papacy.
Monastics practice celibacy. They have renounced wordily things and taken even a new name, and devoted their lives to God and prayer. That's where celibacy fits in better, although I am sure there are exceptions as well. But, separated from wordily temptations, and mixed company, at least it is mroe ocnducive than living in a parish and facing congregations in which immodest dress is not uncommon.
That's why Orthodox monasteries require that all women entering the compound wear long skirts, long sleeves, and head cover. Mount Athos (Holy Mountain) in Greece, an autonomous monastic republic under Echumneical Patriarch's care, will not allow female visitors. It is felt that the mere discernment of female voices would cause great temptations to the monastics.
Oridnary parish priests are not so privileged. They have to interact with the community, and are subjected to temptations on a daily basis, which some naturally find difficult to resist.
The Church always praised and valued celibacy over marriage. But the Eastern Churches at least recognize that "practical difficulties" of married clergy are by far more humane and incomparably less damning than what the Latin parish priests are subjected to.
Celibacy never worked for all, not even the popes. It should be a consideration but it should be something an individual priest decides for himself. The presence of convert priests who are married and allowed to remain married doesn't help the situation of priest shortage either, but only aggravates the issue with double standards.
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