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Saturday Mirror www.nationalmirroronline.net
September 21, 2013
Saturday Starter
The Church has final say
–Monsignor Gabriel Osu, Director, Social Communications, Catholic Archdiocese of Lagos,
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hat informed celibacy in the Catholic Church? This is a whole course of study. It is something that started more than 2,000 years ago. It is not what we would just spend five minutes on phone and discuss. What is your take on whether or not priests should be allowed to marry? What opinion? What other opinion do you want me to have when I have been a priest for more than 32 years now? Do you go to ordination without knowing what you are doing? I don’t have opinion outside the church’s administration and dogmas. I am already inside priesthood. I didn’t become a priest yesterday. I am 32 years into it. So they don’t ask for your opinion. If you have opinion, you would not enter priesthood. I don’t have any personal opinion. No priest has any personal opinion.
Are you aware that some priests are allowed to be married especially in Eastern Europe and some other places? What type of priests? Is it under the Latin rite? Is it under the Roman rite, the Coptic rite, the Egyptian rite? Have you taken time to find out what led to it? But won’t getting married have effect on the alleged straying of some priests? (Cuts in) What are you saying? Is it churches’ teachings that you are saying or your own speculations? The reports were all in the media. We read about priests having amorous relationships with members of their congregation, etc. Though, not in Nigeria of course... (Cuts in). What of if it is in Nigeria? Therefore? So many Nigerians are guilty of corruption. So therefore all Nigerians should be dead? Does it mean they are all bad?
No need for debate –Reverend Father Melchezedek Okpala, Former Anthony Cardinal Okogie’s secretary, now a formator and lecturer at SS Peter and Paul Bodija, Ibadan.
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hould Reverend Fathers get married? There is no need for this debate because the rule of celibacy is a church law so it is a humanly sanctioned discipline which is alterable not a divine law which is unalterable. The Roman rite imposes celibacy as a rule of discipline. I have read some arguments in the past and I know that it is unlikely to change. Celibacy will reduce sexual impropriety among the Catholic clergy when compared to the crisis married clergy have caused in every other denomina-
tion that practises it. Anglicans and Protestants. You can go and look up the statistics, they are unassailable and undeniable. The latest argument for married Catholic clergy stems from the readmittance to the Catholic priesthood of Anglican priests who were married while in the Anglican Communion. The Catholic Church does not permit them to renounce this marriage but grants them special Apostolate. So some proponents say that this is permissible for these special cases so why not for main stream Catholic priests?
‘They should not be allowed to get married’ Thomas Adekola, a Catholic, spoke with TEMITOPE OGUNBANKE
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hat is your view on the agitation that Catholic priests should be allowed to marry? Preventing priests from getting married is biblical but to say whether it is right or not now depends on individual perspective. Personally, I see celibacy as a means to eschew many distractions which getting married might cause a priest. Let us take a look at even the babalawo, Ifa priest, for them to commune with their gods, some of them decided to remain single so as to give their totality to their gods. Do you think many Catholic priests are really keeping to the celibacy oath? About the questions of being faithful with the oath of celibacy by priest, I can’t rule it out that it has not been breached. Love of worldly things has entered the life of many priests. However, we still have priests who still maintain the oath. Those ones are held in high esteem by their followers.
Adekola
What is your take on the issue? They should not be allowed to get married. I think that makes us so unique and highly respected by government. Although the cannon law is subjected to review, l think the church still needs to reiterate on those priests that are in the world but not of the world.
What is even the percentage of these many priests? I said some sir, not many... (Cuts in) Are you saying the priesthood as a universal priesthood or that of just some group of people? No. I said some priests have been found wanting in their sexual relationship with the members of their congregation and others... (Cuts in) Even with Jesus Christ himself, Judas was found wanting. So, what happened? Did the whole apostles die? No, do not talk or write out of sentiments. It does not mean if some priests are bad, the whole church is broken down. I am just asking whether their being allowed to marry could lessen the temptation that may arise? Does it mean nobody is committing any crime in those churches where their priests marry? Even though they have wives, does it mean there is no sin there? These are all sentiments here and there. And there are media talking here, saying. They are even church problems, not problems of you writing or researching. You cannot say because some priests are renegades here and
Osu
there therefore everybody is bad. It is not everything you read in the American press that you take hook, line and sinker. Check the Anglicans, Methodist, Islam, everywhere in the world, there is no place where there is no crime. There are crimes all over. The Catholic Church is universal. It is very wide, from Timbuktu to Sokoto. It is too wide to say that something happened in New York and you are using it to judge all.
Why can’t a priest ever marry?
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n the Eastern rites of the Church it is common for married men to be ordained to the priesthood. Further, in the Latin rite there are a few married men, converted ministers from other faiths, who are ordained to the Catholic priesthood. This, however, is not common. Finally, in neither the Latin rite nor the Eastern rites do priests (or deacons) marry after they have been ordained, except in extraordinary circumstances. The reasons Latin rite priests can’t marry is both theological and canonical. Theologically, it may be pointed out that priests serve in the place of Christ and therefore, their ministry specially configures them to Christ. As is clear from Scripture, Christ was not married (except in a mystical sense, to the Church). By remaining celibate and devoting themselves to the service of the Church, priests more closely model, configure themselves to, and consecrate themselves to Christ. As Christ himself makes clear, none of us will be married in heaven (Mt 22:23– 30). By remaining unmarried in this life, priests are more closely configured to the final, eschatological state that will be all of ours. Paul makes it very clear that remaining single allows one’s attention to be undivided in serving the Lord (1 Cor 7:32–35). He recommends celibacy to all (1 Cor 7:7) but especially to ministers, who as soldiers of Christ he urges to abstain from “civilian affairs” (2 Tm 2:3–4). Canonically, priests cannot marry for a number of reasons. First, priests who belong to religious orders take vows of celibacy. Second, while diocesan priests do not take vows, they do make a promise of celibacy. Third, the Church has established impediments that block the validity of marriages attempted by those who have been ordained. Canon 1087 states: “Persons who are in holy orders invalidly attempt marriage.” This impediment remains as long as the priest has not been dispensed from it, even if he were to attempt a civil marriage, even if he left the Church and joined a non-Catholic sect, and even if he apostatized from the Christian faith altogether. He cannot be validly married after ordination unless he receives a dispensation from the Holy See (CIC 1078 §2, 1). CULLED from Catholic Answers Magazine