Below is a response to the ZENIT interview on the discipline of priestly celibacy by a reader named Adam. I thought it well written enough and with sufficient citation of sources to merit duplication from the comment box to its own post.
This article is of a piece with an increasing, and dangerous, movement on the part of more and more Latins to equate "ontologically" celibacy with priesthood, such that the very being of the latter is defective if missing the former. on this, see Basilo Petra's recent article in the 50th volume, nos. 3-4 (2009) of LOGOS: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies. He unearths some real absurdities.
This priest claims celibacy "could be likened to the revelation of a dogma, though it isn't so at this time." This is also of a piece with an increasing, and even more dangerous, tendency on the part of some Latins to view dogmas as playthings that one can confect when the mood strikes. In this regard, cf. recent and ongoing agitations to dogmatize certain claims about the Theotokos--co-redemptrix, etc. One papal-dogmatic move along these lines in either direction--celibacy or Mary--would blow up, for a century or more, all good will so painstakingly established with the Orthodox over the last generation. And for what? To "prove" the Latins are right? To declare victory in establishing that their heavily fetishized local tradition is somehow universal and superior? Are these people for real??
If Zenit were a real news organization, instead of the propaganda arm of a certain strain of ideological Catholicism, they would not have let this priest get away with claiming that "Studies have convincingly shown that this must be questioned: Celibacy of all clerics wasn't lived, but from the moment of inclusion in the priestly order these men had to live continence with the permission of their wives, because this was a commitment of the couple." There are no such studies--he's just made this up. And then he continues: "Historically because there has been a manipulation of texts and I believe a bad translation that the Eastern Church, which has separated from Rome and has recognized that what they had declared contrary to tradition, could be accepted." Au contraire: it is precisely the Latins who have been manipulating texts or tendentiously interpreting them. This shell-game was given away by one of their former apologists and propagandists, who finally retracted his efforts: I refer, of course, to Roman Cholij.
He ends by reiterating in stronger terms, with reference to episcopal celibacy, "that at stake was the dogmatic issue." That's just nonsense on stilts. There's no dogma here at all--it's purely "disciplinary" just as it is with priests. The apostles were married, and a legitimately married episcopate (i.e., as opposed to concubines and fornication after promises of celibacy became common in the west from the 11th century onward) is common until at least the 4th century. There was no "dogmatic" issue, and there is none today.
Why Latins persist in banging on this issue, when there are so many other more crucial problems today, is a mystery to me. One feels the urge to repeat to them the counsel of the famously taciturn Clement Atlee in responding to the latest litany of leftist agit-prop from Harold Laski: "a period of silence from you would be most welcome."
This priest claims celibacy "could be likened to the revelation of a dogma, though it isn't so at this time." This is also of a piece with an increasing, and even more dangerous, tendency on the part of some Latins to view dogmas as playthings that one can confect when the mood strikes. In this regard, cf. recent and ongoing agitations to dogmatize certain claims about the Theotokos--co-redemptrix, etc. One papal-dogmatic move along these lines in either direction--celibacy or Mary--would blow up, for a century or more, all good will so painstakingly established with the Orthodox over the last generation. And for what? To "prove" the Latins are right? To declare victory in establishing that their heavily fetishized local tradition is somehow universal and superior? Are these people for real??
If Zenit were a real news organization, instead of the propaganda arm of a certain strain of ideological Catholicism, they would not have let this priest get away with claiming that "Studies have convincingly shown that this must be questioned: Celibacy of all clerics wasn't lived, but from the moment of inclusion in the priestly order these men had to live continence with the permission of their wives, because this was a commitment of the couple." There are no such studies--he's just made this up. And then he continues: "Historically because there has been a manipulation of texts and I believe a bad translation that the Eastern Church, which has separated from Rome and has recognized that what they had declared contrary to tradition, could be accepted." Au contraire: it is precisely the Latins who have been manipulating texts or tendentiously interpreting them. This shell-game was given away by one of their former apologists and propagandists, who finally retracted his efforts: I refer, of course, to Roman Cholij.
He ends by reiterating in stronger terms, with reference to episcopal celibacy, "that at stake was the dogmatic issue." That's just nonsense on stilts. There's no dogma here at all--it's purely "disciplinary" just as it is with priests. The apostles were married, and a legitimately married episcopate (i.e., as opposed to concubines and fornication after promises of celibacy became common in the west from the 11th century onward) is common until at least the 4th century. There was no "dogmatic" issue, and there is none today.
Why Latins persist in banging on this issue, when there are so many other more crucial problems today, is a mystery to me. One feels the urge to repeat to them the counsel of the famously taciturn Clement Atlee in responding to the latest litany of leftist agit-prop from Harold Laski: "a period of silence from you would be most welcome."
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