Celibacy for the Sake of the Kingdom

Celibacy for the Sake of the Kingdom

This is not the first of the points I wanted to make regarding why I believe men with SSA should not be admitted to the seminary. It isn’t even one of the essential points either because celibacy is a discipline that can be changed. It is a current requirement for men in the Western rite and that is why I brought it up. Some have argued I have created some novel theological argument. I have not. I am taking what the church has said preistly celibacy is and showing that I think it is incompatible with SSA. Since it has brought up a lot of discussion I am going to elaborate on it here.

In my response to a commenter below I argued that a man with SSA couldn’t truly be a celibate. I think I need to make a clarification here that I should have done earlier. I was arguing specifically for priestly celibacy which is differentiated from other forms. John Paul II describes it in Love and Responsibility on pg 252. “Nor is celibacy the same thing as spiritual virginity. Celibacy is merely abstention from marriage, which may be dictated by a variety of considerations and motives. Thus, people who dedicate themselves to learning or to some form of creative or public activity may decide to abstain from marriage. Sick people unable to live a normal married life may also abstain from it. There are also a large number of persons, especially women, who, although they have to wish at all to renounce marriage, nonetheless remain unmarried. The celibacy of priests in the Catholic Church is a special phenomenon. It is, so to speak, on the border line between celibacy made necessary by the exigencies of social work (the priest has a care of souls, and must live and work for a number of people, a whole community, a parish , for instance), and the spiritual virginity which results from betrothal to God. Priestly celibacy, which goes so closely with dedication to the business of the kingdom of God on earth, asks to be reinforced by spiritual virginity, although the sacrament of Holy Orders can be taken by people who have previously been married.”

None of this changes my original argument, but I should have been tighter on my terms in the beginning so there was less confusion. I am sorry if it caused any confusion.

Now what the Church understands as priestly celibacy is not simply refraining from marriage. As John Paul II pointed out above there are a number of reasons to refrain from marriage and these wouldn’t constitute priestly celibacy. The Church has always understood celibacy as a gift given by God for the service of the Kingdom of Heaven. It is giving up a good (The Sacrament of Marriage) for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven.

Christ talks about this gift in Matthew 19. It has always been understood as complementary and affirming the vocation of marriage. That is why you will find it in the Catechism of the Catholic Church under the topic of Marriage and not of Holy Orders. I am going to quote here three paragraphs under the section entitled Virginity for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven.

Homily – 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year A)

Same Sex Attraction and Seminary Admission policies

As many of you know, especially those of you who have read my blog from the beginning, I have been outspoken on my blog in favor of not ordaining, or admitting to the seminary, men that suffer from Same Sex Attraction (SSA). This post a few more, because a lack of time necessitates, will lay out my reasoning and why I think the Church will reaffirm this decision. Yes, that is right, reaffirm because this policy has been articulated but not enforced since at least 1961.

First I want to post an anonymous comment made in response to a post on my blog and respond to it point by point so as to be sensitive to someone who took the time to comment, but unfortunately made a few mistakes in his reading as well as a few logical fallacies.

The Legacy of John Paul II (The Great)

Reprinted with Permission and with special thanks to
Monsignor Charles M. Mangan

+J.M.J.+

With Gratitude and Admiration:
Reflecting on the Legacy of Pope John Paul II

Monsignor Charles M. Mangan

Anyone who attempts to analyze the notable contributions made to the Church and to the world by Pope John Paul II (1978—2005) is immediately confronted with a pressing question: “Where do I begin?”

The Holy Father said and did so much during his remarkable twenty-six year Pontificate that is it difficult to know where to start, much less to offer an adequate summary.

One could take as his point of departure the Holy Father’s bold proclamation—uttered scores of times in scores of locations—that the human person is created by God in His splendid image and likeness and, therefore, is worthy of love and esteem.

Or one could first consider the pilgrimages, including the famous World Youth Days, which the Vicar of Christ made not only throughout Italy but also around the globe, addressing diverse themes of great importance to his listeners wherever he went.

Instead one could commence this challenging endeavor by highlighting the hundreds of heroic men and women, boys and girls beatified and canonized by Pope John Paul II.

Any of these approaches is valid and worthwhile. This author, however, rather than concentrating on the memorable words and deeds of the late Bishop of Rome, prefers to reflect on the “who” instead of the “what.” Who was Karol Jòzef Wojtyla?

Homily – Feast of St. Matthew & Opening of CCD

One can only hope this is true.

I have been a strong proponent for a long time of not allowing men suffering from SSA to be ordained. I will write a more on this a bit later. In the midst of the “scandal” I to one person “Doesn’t anyone see that in almost ever case it is a priest acting out with a teenage boy? This isn’t Pedophilia.” I was told that I shouldn’t say that to anyone.

Hopefully something is finally going to be done about this.

Homily – 24th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year A)

Server down a bit

I am not sure why the server was down but it is up and running again. Hopefully I will have another site upgrade coming soon. With all this new multimedia stuff I might have to put up the paypal button again. So far it is manageable though.

A first attempt at a non homily podcast

Podcasting

I am hoping to get my first non-homily podcast up sometime before October. I recorded some things on my voice recorder on my trip to Sioux Falls Yesterday. I don’t expect the first one to be very polished but we shall see what happens. It is mostly an experiment. I still need to find a program to edit these things. I need to do noise reduction and transitions from clip to clip. There are some nice programs out there but some are a bit expensive. I am downloading two trial versions now. I am hoping that the cheaper of te two will work.

If I had a school attached to my parish I could get a great discount with educational software. We shall see what happens.

Next week Children’s adoration begins again. I bought a video camera over the summer when Best Buy had 2 years no interest financing. We are switching to the Cathedral so I probably won’t record the first one. Maybe in October. I won’t need to edit that stuff so I think I can find a program that will compress it for the web that won’t cost me anything. I still haven’t loaded the software that came with the the camcorder onto the computer yet so I don’t know what is available there.

I also am waiting for Bestbuy to have another no interest financing deal of at least 18months on desktops. 2 years would be much better but I dont’ expect to see that. My current desktop is getting a little low on power and out of date. An upgrade would allow me to turn my current box into a server which would make me not worry about bandwidth on my webpage server so much.

One other thing I am hoping for is a No interest financing deal on a tank of GAS. Were at $3.20/gallon in Faulkton.

More to come later.