A Brief
History of Celibacy in the Roman Catholic Church |
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This was written when the clergy
abuse story was in the news. -GW The unfolding tragedy of the pedophilia scandal among American Catholic clergy has rekindled the debate over whether priests should be allowed to marry. To better understand this issue, it helps to look at the history of priestly celibacy. As it turns out, the wealth and power of Rome had more to do with the practice than spirituality. Clerics often married until the Middle Ages, until concern, mostly over the loss of Church lands to heirs of priests, led to the imposition of the celibacy rule. Here’s how it came to pass: |
To begin with, Jesus designated
St. Peter, a married man, to be the first pope. Priests had married in
Judaism (the priesthood itself was a hereditary profession), and it
would seem that Christ accepted this part of the tradition in his choice
of Peter. Although St. Paul believed that spreading the Gospel was
easier for a man who didn’t have a family to provide for, he still
mandated that bishops, elders and deacons be only “the husband of one
wife.” (Even then, polygamy among all ranks of the clergy persisted,
and by the third century bishops alone were required to be monogamous.) List of Metroland Stories by Glenn Weiser |
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