Clerical celibacy: Is it time for change? (1)

At a theological convention on Friday, March 12, 2010, Pope Benedict XVI stressed that clerical celibacy is "the sign of full devotion" and of "entire commitment to the Lord". Indeed, it is such for all those men and women who are called to the religious life and for some diocesan priests who feel fulfilled in the lifestyle they have embraced to be open to others.

Sadly, for some diocesan priests, compulsory celibacy is a burden that gets heavier with each passing year; they can easily get involved in illicit relationships or resort to some addiction or perversity. They can be dutiful priests who minister by sheer grit.

A number of frustrated priests generously smile outside while they barely hang on inside. It is not enough for them simply to have good friends, supportive parishioners, clergy-support groups and whatnot. They desperately need a soul mate in marriage. They are being deprived of their divine right to marry because of the stubbornness of heart of the supreme ecclesiastical law-maker, the Pope.

Regrettably, it seems that celibacy is one area of debate which recent popes have not considered appropriate for discussion or for the exercise of collegiality. Many Conferences of Bishops do not feel able to press this discussion even when they feel strongly about it. Any policy which must be maintained with terror and dishonesty creates a heart of darkness in the Body of the Church, a spirit which Christ resists with all his love.

Celibacy should not be called into question because of rampant clerical child abuse. It is not the root cause of this heinous crime. Nor should it be abolished because of a shortage of vocations.

Pastoral life dictates that the laity can be better served by a combination of voluntary clerical celibacy and married priesthood. The Roman Catholic psychiatrist Jack Dominian once remarked that if married priests are to be allowed in the Church, this should be part of a deliberate policy of welcoming sex and marriage as a spiritual norm" (Tablet, 21 September, 1985).

A call for voluntary clerical celibacy is not a request for an innovation but for a restoration, the restoration of a married priesthood which has been an option for most of Church history. Moreover, celibacy has not been compulsory in most Eastern-rite churches in full communion with Rome. Furthermore, there are hundreds of married clergymen worldwide presently ministering in the Roman Catholic Church but who, at one stage, formed part of the Lutheran or Anglican Communion.

Christ's injunction to St Peter: "Thou art Peter and upon this rock I shall build my Church" was addressed to a married man; it was not an exchange between celibates. Peter's character was formed and his mission was carried on in the context of his marriage, not in spite of it.

A paper entitled Broken Promises prepared by Dr Anthony Padovano for the first National Conference On A Married Priesthood held at American University in 1988 stated: "If the Church cannot find an adequate place for married priests, it becomes, at least to this extent, an anti-life Church. What can be a more compelling sign of life than marriage and children? A Church which forbids such life to its priests, a Church which rejects the call of God's people for a married priesthood, is a Church which acts against life and justice, indeed, against its own interests and its own people".