The Priesthood and the Issue of Celibacy

A priest is an alter Christus-another Christ. As such, a priest must be chaste, as Christ was chaste. He must strive to be all that Christ was.

About the ancient practice of married priest, it concerned only cases where a married man wanted to enter the priesthood after he was married. But it was never allowed that a priest who entered the priesthood single got married after entering the priesthood. Dear Christian, it is inaccurate to say that there were married priests in the middle ages. More accurately, there were married priests during the first few hundred years A.D. The practice died out before the Middle Ages. Anyway, it was an exception to the rule, not the norm.

Imagine a priest who had a wife. Do you think that the seal of confession could be kept if he had a wife who kept asking inquisitive questions? No. It is wise for a religious not to have a family, as St Paul teaches. A man who chooses that life must sacrifice his chance to have a family. He enters the priesthood with this knowledge-no one forces him. So he has no right to demand that he be allowed to get married.

May, a woman may not be a priest because Christ cannot be represented by a woman. All the 12 apostles were men. If a woman was eligible, don't you think that He would have chosen His Mother? The equivalent of a male nun would be a monk. God made man and woman for different roles, different temperaments, different abilities, and different roles. The role of a woman can never be that of a priest. But her role is great-she may bring up a future priest, bishop, even pope!