Priests Do Not Have Experience to Prepare People for Marriage, Says Vatican Cardinal

The Irish Times ^ | 7/3/18 | Patsy McGarry

[marshmallow]

Pope Francis, ‘unnoticed, has gradually been putting women into positions of power’

Priests have no credibility when it comes to training people for marriage, according to the most senior Irish cleric in the Vatican.

Cardinal Kevin Farrell, from Drimnagh in Dublin and prefect (head) of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Laity, Family and Life said “priests are not the best people to train others for marriage.

“They have no credibility; they have never lived the experience; they may know moral theology, dogmatic theology in theory, but to go from there to putting it into practice every day....they don’t have the experience.”

Clericalism is dead, the Cardinal behind the World Meeting of Families in Dublin next month also said, “not because we’ve done anything to kill it, but out of sheer numbers.” In Dallas, where he was Bishop from 2007 to 2016, “we have a million and a half Catholics and 75 priests, with a 45 to 50 per cent rate of (Mass) attendance.Those 75 priests are not going to be interested in organising marriage meetings,” he said.

“We have to worry about the 99 per cent, about the baptised, and not worry about the other things we have been obsessed with.” (Dublin’s Catholic archdiocese, with a population of 1.15 million Catholics, has 413 diocesan and religious priests).

[metmom]

He may have been widowed.

Wishful thinking doesn't prove anything.

Either way, the disciples left their former lives behind to spread the Gospel and a few already had itinerant jobs to begin with: as many were fishermen. Paul worked as a tentmaker, etc...

But they didn't leave their wives behind.

1 Corinthians 9:5 Do we not have the right to take along a believing wife, as do the other apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas?

Wives can and do work very successfully in partnership with their husbands in spreading the gospel and ministering to people.

There's no way a man of any integrity would leave a wife behind and abandon her to fend for herself.

[metmom]

Then they don't love Christ and abuse His Grace if they formed a Christian marriage and divorced. Christ's commands on marriage is quite explicit; a person of age has the mental capacity to understand that. Modern era (Which is no excuse) be damned, people stayed together because they heeded the Word and societies that embraced the Word.

BTW, the Word is crystal clear, even for those who claim Sola Scriptura along with the other "Solas" that go with the Word.

And I have not seen one person who adheres to SS who ever disagreed with that.

So why are you telling us that?

[metmom]

If I understand history correctly, marriage was the norm for ALL men.

However, the Levitical priesthood that God established included and allowed for parried men, although there were some restrictions on who they could marry.

Genesis 2:18 Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him.”

Marriage was God's idea and He established it, performed the first wedding, and blessed it.

[trebb]

Jesus never married for obvious reasons....

Paul stated his opinions and told us they were his own opinions and not directed from "above"...

You have shown one of the problems with religions - those who entertain them manage to see what they want to see in the Bible and ignore the rest.

Question: Where in the Bible does it tell us that teachers were also preferred to be married heads of households with good records of managing their household? Maybe researching it may help....

[MayflowerMadam]

“Priests Do Not Have Experience to Prepare People for Marriage, Says Vatican Cardinal”

Neither do most Protestant ministers, whose own marriages often are abysmal.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I think you’re right that marriage was the norm for adult men and women, once they had reached maturity: for girls, menarche. That’s not only for Israel but for the human race.

Life expectancy was short, as well, and infant mortality was high, so you wanted to have plenty of babies young, so some would survive to adulthood.

Thus the only sexual “timing” instruction in the Bible involved abstaining from sex from the onset of monthly bleeding, until 7 days afterward. That means spouses abstained for about 12 days each month, and commenced intercourse just before ovulation.

If we followed God’s Biblical rules for kosher sex -— marriage at adolescence, sex at peak fertility -—it would definitely boost the birthrate! Might be a good idea esp. for European and
and American Christians.

[nobamanomore]

Yes, and it seems that they did a good job till about 1965, for about 1900 years or so.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I don’t want marriage instructions from somebody who thinks of sexual love as “getting laid”.

[morphing libertarian]

10 people you must have learned something lol

[Mrs. Don-o]

Men and women should be taught about the importance of realizing that a valid sacramental marital bond is lifelong and indissoluble by any person or power on earth. And should manifest the inseparable love bond between Christ the Bridegroom and His Bride, the Church.

[Mrs. Don-o]

Ruth Graham (Billy's wife) was asked whether, considering the difficulties of being a globetrotting preacher's wife, she had ever considered divorce.

She said, "No. Murder yes, but never divorce."

[Mrs. Don-o]

She was under the impression that "da rules" were made by men, not God. That's the first, and the worst mistake.

That's probably why she left the Church.

opinions about the Church the Church, from ex-Catholics.

[Mrs. Don-o]

The cardinal referenced is a fool.

[Mrs. Don-o]

With reference to taking one’s parents’ marriage as a guide: Was it Gilda Radner (?) who said, “If you can’t be a good example, you’ll just have to be a horrible warning.”

[Tax-chick]

Surveys of Protestant clergy find that a majority of them report that their profession results in difficulties in their family life. I suppose that’s the sort of thing they could mention in premarital counseling - “There is likely to be constant tension between your work commitments and your family.” - but so could a Catholic priest or any random schmo off the street who reads a newspaper or watches TV.

[Tax-chick]

Better than being married to one, though.

[Tax-chick]

I don’t know, but it’s a wise observation.

[Mrs. Don-o]

"The Catholic church can beat the sex is bad/marriage is bad drum all they want and they are only going to be at odds with God. "

C'mon, metmom, give me about a million breaks. You're an educated person, you know better than that.

That Catholic Church has never in its whole history taught that marriage or sex is bad. You must have the Shakers in mind --- or the Albigensians --- or Jansenism. You can look all three up, under the general category of "heresies opposed by the Catholic Church."

The Church teaches the exact opposite, which is that Marriage is a Sacrament, and sexual intercourse is a constitutive element of that Sacrament.

So while virginity ("for the Kingdom of God", as Jesus put it) is noble and honorable, marital lovemaking is inherently sacramental, and --- note this -- celibacy is not.

That's what the Catholic Church says.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I actually laughed out loud.

Which is essential, on practically a daily basis, for marriage.

Me and Don-o, 30 years this New Years Eve.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I totally agree with your post.

Thank God for the GOOD Bishop Tom Tobin. BTW, my mnemonic for keeping him distinguished from the "other" Bishop Tobin is that T.T. -- suits me to a T. And God's Providence (RI) put him where he is.