"
Fr. Richard’s statement on the new revelations of priestly abuse and coverup:
This moral catastrophe first of all demands public and sincere lamentation from every segment of the Body of Christ, and only then can the deep healing begin. It also demands public ownership, repentance and reform of our very immature teaching in regard to sexuality in general, male power issues in particular, and our “enforced” understanding of celibacy, which will predictably produce this kind of result.
- Our own Catholic theology says that celibacy is a “charism” which means a free and empowered gift. In my experience, only someone who has an alive and warm inner experience of God is capable of celibacy at all.
- It is a contradiction in terms for the Catholic Church to think it can mandate a free gift, which of course, has no precedent in Jesus. It is clearly not necessary for ministry, and is often a liability, creating an aura of spiritual superiority when the exact opposite is often the case.
- I personally believe the actual charism of male celibacy that produces both happy and healthy men by the second half of life, is quite rare.
- Until the Catholic church disconnects celibacy from ministry, I think we will continue to have ordained men, who are both unhappy, unhealthy, and a scandal to the Body of Christ. (Lest anyone think incorrectly, I am not saying that celibacy causes pedophilia, but I am saying that the idealized culture of celibacy allowed it to hide there for a long time.)
This shadowy material will keep emerging unless we own it and hold it fully accountable. In the meantime, let’s all pray and try to live more authentic sexual and spiritual lives ourselves.
"
Within the context of the Roman Catholic church this is (presumably) a stirring call which many Catholics will agree with and many Catholics will resist (as, to date, all such calls have been resisted). But within the Anglican churches of the Communion, is this not also food for thought in our debates re permanent, faithful, loving same-sex partnerships which often boils down to "partnership" v "celibacy", with the latter mandated without - in my reading - much discussion about celibacy itself.
On the one hand, Rohr makes a statement about Catholic theology's treatment of celibacy as a gift. Anglican theologians might not agree that celibacy is a gift. But then, whatever adjective we use for our theology, a critical Scripture is 1 Corinthians 7:7 where Paul describes his own celibate situation in terms of "a particular gift from God". Anglicans can scarcely escape the force of that, can we?
So, here, to keep discussion focused and not escaping into fields over which we have trampled many times, the specific question for discussion is this: is celibacy a gift or a mandate?
30 comments:
Peter, four thoughts.
(1) *If*, as TEC's Task Force for the Study of Marriage (TFSM) has opined, marriage *today* is itself a calling that requires some discernment, conviction, waiting, and testing-- an assumption well worth discussing-- then either celibacy is provisionally mandated for everyone or else we are sliding farther down Brendan's slippery slope away from the Judaic norms of scripture.
(2) On the topics of That and of Roman celibacy, commentators often assume that straight folk today are living simple lives in the marriages idealised in the pre-feminist 1950s. But even in churches with much more official and informal scolding about sex and gender roles, that is surely untrue. Is it realistic or facile to assume that Roman clergy (among others... ;-) will find it simple to leap from difficult but supported celibacy to courtship and marriage in the post-feminist wilderness?
(3) In churchly conversation, do we care about sex etc for Christian reasons rooted in the gospel (eg Stanley Hauerwas), or simply as responsible, caring human beings obliquely supported in that by the Holy Spirit (eg traditional Quakers)?
(4) Like all human phenomena, the RCC's problem is multi-causal. Would the wisest intervention target celibacy or clericalism?
BW
(5) The Holy Spirit is unlikely to leave our societies and churches in the present mess, yet nothing lost is perfectly restored in this aeon. If the next discipleship for sexuality cannot be patterned around early modern marriage, then what else might define it?
(6) In the paradigm that we have lost-- perhaps it endures on the blessed isles-- raw law failed to represent the growth in wisdom and character that St Paul supposes in his vice lists, virtue lists, haustafeln, etc. When misdeeds come to light, we are often startled by how little the pious malefactor expected to grow beyond the mind-set of, say, middle childhood. Might a trajectory of virtuous life-long change be the next scriptural paradigm?
BW
Interestingly, Peter, the only category that Jesus spoke of in terms of celibacy was that of the eunuch (so disposed) "for the sake of the Kingdom of God". This, presumably, is the deep-seated rationale for the Roman Catholic understanding of the sort of self-sacrificial dedication needed for its clergy and Religious.
This category of 'eunuch' could, of course, have included that which Jesus attributed to the one "from his mother's womb", whose disposition could still fit him/her for a celibate life, but did not necessarily equip him/her for either priesthood or Religious life.
Another point of interest is the scarcity of Anglican male clergy who are willing, "for the sake of the Kingdom", to renounce their sexual capability. Having tried it myself, I can tell you it requires much more than a devotion to moral rectitude!. I admire those of our Church who actually do, in this sense, with the help of God, "Give up everything for the sake of the Kingdom"
Rome certainly prohibited Jesus' other category of eunuch from priestly ministry - "those made so by men" - because they had been deliberately castrated - often by officials of the Church in order to access the resultant castrato voice for use in Church choirs.
Sadly, what often is discounted in conversations of this kind is the sheer number of male clergy, both Roman Catholic and Anglican, whose extra-curricular dalliance with females causes as much, if not more scandal for their superiors than illicit 'same-sex relationships'.
Sex, for most people - because of our inherent created nature - is here to stay. What we do with that gift, of course, is important; whether for procreation or; "the comfort one ought to have of the other".
Peter, I think that Father Ron means to say that celibacy is neither a gift nor a mandate, and that he is really really really homesick for those fields over which we have trampled so many times ;- )
I think one's answer to my (3) determines one's most consistent response to your query. We can have Christian rules for sex, if and only if one can identify the religious beliefs that motivate them. Rules that lack such upstream motivation are hard to defend to our dear friends in Christ who lie awake at night worrying that not all are getting enough sex.
BW
Hi Bowman
I am not sure that I am properly tuned into your radio signal but the static might be in my ears and not in the airwaves.
I read Paul and Scripture (including Genesis and Song of Songs) as affirming that the desire for intimacy, companionship and sexual fulfilment (one flesh) is very, very strong. In an extraordinary testimony, I can only think of one character in the OT who is single-for-life, Jeremiah, though others become single through widowhood, though even then a new marriage is celebrated (notably Ruth). When Paul talks about the gift of celibacy I assume he is talking about a "something" which enables not only moral virtue (which is expected of all) but also quells if not suppresses that strong desire I describe above. (Or, maybe not. Paul doesn't spell out what the gift consists of, except he gives me, at least, the strong impression that the alternative to the gift of celibacy is marriage.)
Now, when put in those terms, I am trying to express a universal longing of the human heart for intimacy with another human heart. I am not sure that talking about 1950s marriages etc is either here or there re such matters.
Richard Rohr's point, I understand, to be that human authority orders other humans at the potential peril of communities when it mandates that heart to heart intimacy is necessarily denied, without also discerning for possession of the gift of celibacy. That mandate may be accepted by those resolved to be heroic in the endeavour of celibacy, and there have been many such heroes. But Rohr's point is also that in a community of celibates, there may be, alongside gifted celibates and heroic celibates those who are neither and who, if empowered to be brutally self-honest, would admit their preference to be able to share in the joy of intimacy with a fellow adult human. But the mandated approach does not appear to empower such honesty, let alone offer those who are offer a way forward towards the gift of ... marriage. Is this not true in every generation?
I think ‘tis both a mandate and a gift. A mandate for all until such time as a marriage partner or not is found. A gift for the few felt called by Christ to be so. Obviously the Catholic Church does not at present offer the option of the latter. And mandates, being what they are, are oft broken and not always desired.
Certainly the Catholic Church has faced it’s share of sexual abuse scandal, as has the Anglican Church, as has the family unit wherein the majority of such abuse takes place. As the post said the ‘ideal’ attached to clerical celibacy may have provided an unhealthy hiding place within the Catholic Church. The degree of authority attached to Priestly positions no doubt also contributes. We see the connection with authority in the recently revealed Law Firm scandals in NZ. Such abuse is not only associated with single men or women it a sin associated with humanity as a whole.
Nick is probably already typing this somewhere, Peter, but those in the Roman rite of the RCC who differ from RR argue that discernment of a capability for celibacy precedes candidacy for orders. So the mandate is that, once ordained, the only release from the obligation of celibacy is laicisation.
In the papacy of Paul VI, laicisation for clergy and religious for marriage was much more common than it has been since. A change of culture, but not of doctrine or discipline, could enable a return to that post-Vatican II liberality.
BW
Sorry about the noise, Peter, my broadcast engineer thought that your OP was inviting a broader discussion about celibacy per se.
You read the OT as celebrating sex while I see it as just mirroring what happens-- good and evil-- and occasionally explaining or regulating it. I think I detect an incipient appeal to scriptural authority in your comment, but I am unsure what the OT alone can actually support, especially when its references to procreation are discounted.
And St Paul was odd, though no more than we might expect of an unmarried once-violent prisoner who had met the ascended Lord, had both stoned and been stoned, and had traveled to the third heaven. So when he wishes that his readers might be as he is, we say "Paul, what on earth (or elsewhere) do you mean by that?" And when he explains that a spouse really is too much bother unless one is absolutely necessary, we want to protest "Did you write Ephesians 5 or not?" He is neither a feminist nor a misogynist; he cares about *la difference* mainly when he worries-- why?-- that angels are being confused by hipster hairstyles. Like the young Justin Welby, St Paul would surely not be among the top 999 of a thousand candidates for a future in the Church of England. I read him-- we should all read him-- but we may not be able to skim ready guidance off his 70 pages like cream off milk.
BW
Hi Peter,
Does not this, take us back to a previous thread, where Bryden summed it up rather succinctly; with his comments about "the cart being in front of the horse"? Is celibacy the real issue at stake? No, because this type of abuse is found in heterosexual relationships. It is, indeed found wherever someone has power over another person. It is found in the home, schools, clubs and sports teams, Churches and politics. So when we put,"it is my RIGHT"; in front of Christs call to us,"to come and follow me to Calvary"; then there will be parts of the OLD MAN which we will not yield up to being TRANSFORMED.Was not Abraham prepared to give up his only son? Lets have some more from Bryden on that Trinitarian Horse please.
I think it was Jean who recently highloighted the limitations of English-language theology. Just as we conflate different concepts in the one English word "love", so she pointed out confusion around the word "priest".
I'm very interested in the discussion which limits ordaining to the presbyterate only those who are called to the diaconate. Similarly, Latin Rite Roman Catholics generally limit ordaining to the presbyterate those called to celibacy. The very long Christian tradition is that one cannot marry after ordination.
Blessings
Bosco
Hi Peter; the CCC summaries the two codes of canon law (west and eastern rites).
1579 All the ordained ministers of the Latin Church, with the exception of permanent deacons, are normally chosen from among men of faith who live a celibate life and who intend to remain celibate "for the sake of the kingdom of heaven."70 Called to consecrate themselves with undivided heart to the Lord and to "the affairs of the Lord,"71 they give themselves entirely to God and to men. Celibacy is a sign of this new life to the service of which the Church's minister is consecrated; accepted with a joyous heart celibacy radiantly proclaims the Reign of God.72
1580 In the Eastern Churches a different discipline has been in force for many centuries: while bishops are chosen solely from among celibates, married men can be ordained as deacons and priests. This practice has long been considered legitimate; these priests exercise a fruitful ministry within their communities.73 Moreover, priestly celibacy is held in great honor in the Eastern Churches and many priests have freely chosen it for the sake of the Kingdom of God. In the East as in the West a man who has already received the sacrament of Holy Orders can no longer marry.
So, we already have a contradiction which becomes more confusing when married eastern rite priests in the West want to minister in a Latin rite church. We also have married Anglican priests who are received into one of the Ordinariates as full Roman Catholics and who then say the Roman Rite albeit the Anglican use approved by the Holy See.
So where does that leave us? I think celibacy is a gift for a minority and it’s true importance is betrayed by the exceptions. If a man wants to marry as a deacon and become a priest, an eastern rite church in London or New York must be attractive. After that a move to a Roman Rite church is not impossible.
The real topic however is why some of these men take a vow that they cannot meet. You’d think a man in his 20s would work out probabilities.
Nick
For my money, the comments in this video are helpful - though I did appreciate the scope of BW at the start above:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AdR8eyaDCHg&utm_source=Ascension+Press&utm_campaign=d36794b77a-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_08_22_07_19&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_e09e12a778-d36794b77a-350097297&goal=0_e09e12a778-d36794b77a-350097297&mc_cid=d36794b77a&mc_eid=899584b34c
Dear Nick, at the Anglican seminary I attended - being at that time a Franciscan Novice, I - together with all the other would-be ordinands st that time (two of whom later were to become Bishops in our Church) - was required to take classes in what was called 'Human Development', which clearly pointed out the problems associated with any premature dedication to the celibate life. Although this was not required of Anglican clergy, the course on human development was most useful to me - in middle age - then contemplating a further commitment to the celibate life in 'First Profession' as an SSF Brother. It was at this stage that I felt a call to priesthood which required me to make a different commitment - not to the Religious Life, but as a secular priest.
I do wonder - after speaking withg R.C. Franciscan colleaugues during my noviciate - whether the Catholic Church requires a too-early commitment to the celibate life, from youngsters whose sexuality may not yet be fully developed?
Hi Nick and Ron
My own estimation (through various conversations, reflecting on my own life and development, observing my children's generation) is that I would personally be loath to receive a profession of celibacy from someone under the age of 30. I am not as confident as you, Nick, that we can - these days - expect the required self-understanding-come-readiness-for-commitment-to-celibacy from those in their 20s.
Fr Ron and Peter; yes I agree. What I mean is that many men can tell you in their 20s that celibacy would not work for them. Why some other men delude themselves is a mystery.
Nick
Dear Peter
I think discussing celibacy as a response to clergy abuse may be a dangerous smokescreen. I think the Pope has it right by focusing on clericalism. Celibacy may add to the mystique of clericalism and so bolster clericalism but it is not the heart of clericalism.
I am confused by your message that you would personally be loath to receive a profession of celibacy from someone under the age of 30. Are you suggesting that only once one has abstained from sexual activity for the first 30 years of one’s life is it appropriate to consider vowing to celibacy?
I would like to suggest that there is a greater similarity than difference between faithfulness to the vows of marriage and faithfulness to the vow of celibacy. The gift is about faithfulness to vows. The greater difference of both is to promiscuity rather than to each other.
You seem to be suggesting that most humans just cannot control their sexual passions – which, if correct, leads to two options: sex before marriage is fine, or marry young.
If you do not expect the required self-understanding-come-readiness-for-commitment-to-celibacy from those in their 20s, then how might you expect the required self-understanding-come-readiness-for-commitment-to-marriage from those in their 20s?
Some monastic orders seek, contra your advice, younger applicants – the formation and transformation of the Rule becomes harder the older one is, the more one is set in one’s habits (pun?).
Blessings
Bosco
That is a lot of inference going on, Bosco!
Obviously (I hope) I agree with you that all vows to all forms of faithfulness require formation/maturity, knowledge of self and of life (i.e. the larger context in which one vows to be faithful, whether as a spouse or as a professed monastic).
My point above is focused on making a vow to eschew marriage as a path of life. Any Christian taking marriage vows is taking vows for a path of life which most peers take or will take; and is taking vows towards fulfilment of sexual desire (even as they are also vows towards monogamous faithfulness, i.e. non-fulfilment of all desires for sex). By contrast a Christian taking a vow of celibacy is taking a vow for a path of life which scarcely any peers will be taking and is taking a vow towards a non-fulfilment of sexual desire via sexual intercourse. That is a stringent vow and one I take seriously as an intended lifetime vow, which means looking ahead in life, recognising that marriage is not an option in ones 30s, 40s, etc.
In respect of today's world, in which many young adults in their 20s seem unable to settle to anything (!!), I am simply saying I would be more cautious about someone taking a vow of celibacy for the rest of their lives than taking a vow of marriage to a spouse for the rest of their lives.
I suspect, Peter, that over a glass of wine, we would be in agreement. In a blog dialogue we appear to approach this differently. Alongside its (statistical) rarity, the Christian vow to celibacy is prepared for by years of prayer, reflection, and study - and with years of trialing such a life. The Christian vows of marriage are often reflected on with a two or three meetings in the vicar's study - if that. Those who find they leave celibacy for marriage may upset a community and individuals; those who find they leave one marriage for another often leave a trail of human suffering in their wake.
Blessings
Bosco
Hi Peter; judging by the latest Roman disgrace to the Universal Church, I suggest that celibacy is a gift bestowed on almost no-one. It’s perhaps early days, but Francis might need to move to the rest home. Although Rorate Caeli are usually extreme, I think they are correct today. The Francis papacy is dead. The corpse stinks.
Nick
Hi Nick
It is sometimes said that all political careers end in failure (with occasional John Key type exceptions) but a lot of ecclesiastical "careers" could be similarly judged (noting Rowan Williams' ABC role promised much but ended mired in the complexities of the Communion's politics). Either way, it is very sad seeing what is unfolding re Francis.
I can think of no worse advice for both conservative and liberal Protestants in our current cultural climate than to devalue celibacy or turn it into a special "gift" reserved for the special few. Rohr's advice end up resting on a problematic understanding of how gifts operate in the New Testament as special abilities we somehow inherently possess rather than as gifts given to the church for the purpose of mission and resourcing the saints in the position that are already in. People who wish to quote small segments of 1 Corinthians 7 might do well to pay attention to the central section of the chapter in verses 17-24.
Our current discussion about sexuality and chastity in the church utterly ignores the reality that many single Christians face all the time. Most of these single people actually end up being heterosexual women, many of whom face far more limited marital options statistically than do heterosexual men in the church if they wish to marry someone who shares their faith and and desire honour their Christian calling while also having some degree of maturity. Are we willing to suggest that because celibacy is a gift, that these women should simply surrender to cultural norm that sexual and marital intimacy is some kind of human right? Indeed, as Rusty Reno has argued, one of the reasons that middle and liberal anglicans have largely given up on a traditional understanding of chastity applied to homosexual relationships is that because they no longer believe that such a traditional approach is realistic for heterosexual relationships either. This is why Anglicans in the west are so reluctant to preach from scripture about sexual ethics or chastity - not simply because we are worried about causing offence to gay christians but because we fear how this might challenge the sexual immorality of the flock as a whole.
I would also note how problematic Rohr's approach to celibacy is for the likes of Wesley Hill and other celibate gay Christians who are working through exactly the meaning of 1 Corinthians 7:17-24 as gay Christians who subscribe to orthodox teaching regarding sexual relationships yet wish to allow God to use their orientation for the good of the kingdom and help rethink the way the contemporary church views friendship and intimacy in general. These people receive flack from virtually all sides of the church for trying to honour their calling, from conservatives for not denouncing their orientation as a social identity and from liberals for not being open to same sex sexual relationships as chaste. Once again, celibacy is not here a choice, it is a gift they have welcomed within the specific circumstances of life which they find themselves in and which God works for their good through his sovereign purposes.
Protestants need more than ever to talk about celibacy, rather than creating a fetish out of marriage (a conservative temptation) or deciding that this is simply unrealistic as with our culture. In reacting against what is perceived as a legacy of platonic aceticism with regard to sex, we have basically abandoned the best of a Christian tradition that saw celibacy as valued vocation within a far richer framework of friendship and ecclesial intimacy than is understood today by contemporary protestants. We would do well to be more Catholic and less Protestant when it comes to sexuality in general. I could again point to the alarming silence and shallowness of protestants when it comes to other contemporary ethical issues involving sexuality, reproduction, theology of the body in comparison to many Catholics, much of whom are actually lay people rather than priests.
Rabbis marry. But large communities of Haredi or Hasidic Jews also have a plague of child sexual abuse.
It may be that, no matter what the sexual regimen, religious professions attract more prospective predators than chance alone would predict. Donald Capps's Men, Religion, and Melancholia (1997) makes a qualitative case for a similar but different link from boys' loss of maternal affection to adult lives of struggle with depression and consolation in religion.
BW
Possibly BW but the majority of sexual abusers are related to or friends of the family of victims and these make up the majority of sexual abuse cases. Yes it happens in religious organisations and other organisations also but I would be reluctant to say it is any worse - perhaps more publicised because as is expected Priests, Teachers hold positions with high moral expectations. Abuse of the trust given them is therefore a public betrayal as well as an individual betrayal.
Yes, Jean.
Tragically, we will soon have so nuch data on this that several statistically sound inferences will be drawn with confidence.
My main point meanwhile is that mere sexual frustration does not explain sexual perversion or cover-ups. When an Orthodox metropolitan diverted church funds to a girlfriend in Florida, that breach of celibacy was the reversion to the normal pattern that we all expect will occasionally happen. But we know about this case because another bishop investigated a suspicion and filed charges. This is exactly what is not happening in the RCC.
Again, a celibate homosexual Anglo-Catholic TEC bishop I knew had no hesitation about promptly firing, defrocking, and excommunucating the unmarried chaplain of a boarding school for teen-aged girls for sexual improprities with staff and students. Some might attribute the chaplain's trangressions to normal frustration, but the celibate bishop dealt swiftly with the unmarried priest-- the latter welcomed us to an ecumenical L-A-RC conference there at 8 am and was out of the job, out of the church, and in the sheriff's custody by lunchtime. If a TEC bishop can do this, why can't an RCC bishop?
Our general ideas about human sexuality inform us properly about neither incidents of a plainly abnornal practice, nor about the astonishing failure of local Catholic bishops and Vatican curia who police their church very effectively in other matters.
I am inclined to agree with Bosco and Richard. Is blaming child rape and obstruction of justice on a theory that nen can never keep their zippers up precisely the slide down the slippery slope that Brendan was predicting here just several months ago? One can frame the matter as he might in terms of the avoidance of a moral authority for sex that is transcendent, objective, and indispensible. Or one can ask-- does God's new creation really change nothing about human sexuality?
BW
Agreed BW ... does the ‘new creation’ change nothing about the way we live out sexuality or celibacy as Christians and are we too scared to touch the subject? When ‘that topic’ was being discussed during a Bible study I attend one woman asked, “Why don’t they preach about infidelity?” Another replied in jest, “Because they would loose half the people in the Church.” Although in jest it is fair to say there was indeed a grain of truth in it!
Unfortunately or fortunately I cannot comment on men’s ability to constrain their desires nor do I know enough about how the RC Church differs in its discipline and action compared to say the CofE where there has also been recent scandals relating to boarding schools/Priests.
Nick, Douthat--
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/28/opinion/pope-francis-catholic-church-resign.html?
BW
On the blog-site of Richard Peers, an Anglo-Catholic priest in the Church of England I found this thought-provoking addendum to his post on 'Issues of Human Sexuality' in the C,of E.:
"In the Church Times last week (31 August 2018) the Secretary General of the Anglican Communion is quoted, (ironically under the heading ‘Christians don’t like hearing the truth’) as saying that “‘the C of E may need to exercise 'self-restraint of a sacrificial kind' in matters of sexuality.”
Self-sacrifice can be healing and redemptive. Sacrificing others without their consent is wicked, dangerous and destructive – and not just for them. However, the fundamental problem is that it is not LGBT people who are being sacrificed, it is truth itself. Jesus, the way, the truth and the life is nailed to the cross by our untruthfulness. Meanwhile, the world yearns for truth."
A sad commentary on the ambivalence of most Christian Churches on the predominantly heterosexual hierarchies wanting to impose celibacy on LGBTI people - while yet saying nothing about heterosexual relationships that are less than perfect.
Another (short) article some may find helpful: http://catholicphilly.com/2018/09/news/local-news/clergy-sex-abuse-not-about-gay-priests-top-psychologist-says/
This also makes for interesting readinghttps://www.ncronline.org/news/accountability/convicted-soul-priest-perpetrator-child-sexual-abuse-shares-his-story
Does it appear to anyone else that at least a few of the myriad RCC bishops would have responded to the horror if they had not been waiting for a coordinated response or else permission to act from Rome?
Did curial micromanagement (eg of doctrine under JP2) paralyze local bishops?
BW
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