Usually the National Catholic Reporter is good for some laughs but this article reads like a Chick Track. The title “Celibacy’s history of power and money” was a clue to the potential stupidity of this article from the Unrational Catholic Distorter.
Whoa, slow down a minute on the celibacy talk and married priests. Let’s remind ourselves how the Catholic church got into the celibacy mess.
It didn’t have anything to do with sex, purity and holiness.
It was the money.
And when one mixes money and the Catholic church, there’s usually a mess. That’s how we got a Reformation. Selling indulgences — guarantees of time off in purgatory.
If the church tried selling indulgences today it would be prosecuted under the RICO law.
Indulgences were and are guarantees signed and sealed by folks in no position to deliver on the promise. Indulgences were sold by those who had invented the idea of purgatory in the first place (there is no biblical basis for purgatory).
I guess there must not be any room in NCR’s biblcal canon for 2 Maccabees and verses 12:38-46. I always thought that their bible might be missing something, like the first 74 books. To them the Gospels are called the Apocrypha.
…Martin Luther, a sort of one-man medieval equivalent of the Securities and Exchange Commission (indulgences division) blew the whistle. And signaled the fate of all future whistleblowers. Obloquy, and a formal apology 400 years too late.
Well actually Martin Luther was post medieval when he posted his list on the cathedral door.
Religions have always had a place for virgins. But it customarily meant women, as in pagan Rome’s vestal virgins. Emperor Augustus, incidentally, frowned on celibacy. Celibate males weren’t allowed to inherit property. (Hold that thought from Roman law. A thousand years later it gave us today’s problems.)
Then came Jesus, and then came priests.
I would like to see one case where somebody being celibate caused a problem, all of the sexual abuse cases arose out of them not being celibate.
St. Paul wasn’t arguing for celibacy. Admittedly, he said it was easier to be a member of a missionary group if you weren’t encumbered with a wife and children, but the CEO of many a corporation harbors the same feelings (though perhaps remains reluctant to voice them publicly).
Now where in 1st Corinthians does Paul talk about celibacy associated with missionary groups. Of course it is funny to think of celibacy if you want a “missionary position.” What Paul actually said was:
I want you to be free from anxieties. The unmarried man is anxious about the affairs of the Lord, how to please the Lord; But the married man is anxious about worldly affairs, how to please his wife, and his interests are divided. And the unmarried woman or girl is anxious about the affairs of the Lord, how to be holy in body and spirit; but the married woman is anxious about worldly affairs, how to please her husband.
The rest of the article just goes on with the canard about celibacy coming about to prevent the clergy from giving church property as inheritance to their children. That it was all about property and not propriety.
5 comments
This guy, Arthur Jones, is NCR’s “editor at large?” What a joke! There are some legitimate arguments against celibacy (if you ignore nearly 2000 years of tradition, that is), but he missed them. The basis for his opinion is not only historically inaccurate, it’s half-baked and blasphemous to boot.
Your premise is correct: the “problem” is not caused by celibacy, but by a lack thereof.
Good job, Jeff. I mean it.
Jeff, if celibacy is so important, then why does Rome ordain married Protestant ministers who convert? Such an act undercuts the very rationale for celibacy. Now, you might say that Rome is making exceptions. If so, it’s also creating a double standard: mandatory celibacy is right for some but not for others?
Besides, celibacy in this Church has been a joke for centuries: priests in South America and Italy routinely have concubines and episcopal officials (including the Pope) do nothing. My maternal grandfather left a minor seminary in which he was studying because of the hypocracy.
Furthermore, the “canard” about celibacy as a means to prevent priests from giving property to children is not a canard; respected scholars like Roland Bainton say the same.
Furthermore, Jeff, mandatory celibacy might just be the reason why so many homosexuals have entered the priesthood, thus creating a pervasive subculture that doesn’t seem to mitigate against pedophilia.
Furthermore, the quotation in 1st Corinthians is a suggestion, not a command. Throughout his epistles, St. Paul distinguishes between personal suggestions and commands from the Lord. This quotation falls in the category of the former.
There’s only one question that need be asked about mandatory celibacy: Does it enhance or inhibit the proclamation of the Gospel? If it results in re-energized dedication and witness, it should be kept. If it results in a pervasive homosexual subculture, declining vocations and compromised witness, it should be scrapped. If it does both, then which factors prevail?
I came across the mentioned Arthur Jones article in connection with a university semester paper where I am to discuss the War of Investiture between the Roman Church and the Holy Roman Empire (the German Kings…). I am not an expert on scripture, but grew up in the Methodist church. I consider myself a believer of God, but not a believer in the church of God, as it has proven itself to be nothing more than corrupt (at best) through its 2000 year history. If another organization were as corrupt, and had the conscience of the hundreds of thousands of lives that the Roman Church has (or, should have), then that organization would be shut down and the leader imprisoned. I have seen too many independet references that support Arthur Jones’ article. Simoni – buying votes – WAS accepted in the middle ages. This is fact, just as the historical aspects of Jones’ article are also fact.
My suggestion to all christians would be to take a step back and stop swallowing all the propaganda being spewed out by the church. You CAN accept Jesus as your savior without buying into the lies put out by the church. The church is nothing more than wordly men, who also are open for unlawful, or at the least, less than moral, actions.