Dear Bishop, you're fired. Love, the Pope.

[JimC]

'cept the catholic church does have married priests - so not a matter of dogma. Married RC priests are what you get when married priests in other sects (eg Lutherans, Church of England) decide to join the RCs and are accepted.

You guys really should try to get the hang of using search engines.

I suspect the hierarchy really, really hates those situations, but puts up with it because they love the thought of poaching even more...

[Seth]

'cept the catholic church does have married priests - so not a matter of dogma. Married RC priests are what you get when married priests in other sects (eg Lutherans, Church of England) decide to join the RCs and are accepted.

You guys really should try to get the hang of using search engines.

Interesting assertion. I'll check it out with my Catholic sources and get back to you.

[Pensioner]

http://www.elandar.com/back/summer02/st ... mejia.html

“The early Church was family-based,” says John Schuster, a vice president at Celibacy is the Issue (CITI), an organization of married priests. A cursory look at Church history supports his assertion.

For the first dozen or so centuries of the Church’s existence, not only priests, but also bishops and popes married and raised families. As the Church expanded from the Middle East into Europe, many changes occurred. Interaction with Greco-Roman culture impacted Church views on sex and marriage. At the same time, the Church’s power grew and wealthy landowners began donating more property to parishes. Many priests viewed these gifts as personal and would sometimes bequeath them to their heirs, upsetting the Church hierarchy.

By the eleventh century, shifting cultural views, which included the recognition of celibacy as a valuable religious choice, were used to support practical considerations. First, Pope Benedict VIII made it illegal for priest’s children to inherit property. Then, in 1139, the Second Lateran Council made celibacy an official requirement for priesthood.”

[Svartalf]

Pen, you're spouting nonsense... as early as the fifth century, there are writings noting that not only priests and bishops, but even the lower clerical orders of readers and singers were not supposed to marry, to the point that places where this custom was not followed were remarkable. By that time, the Orthodox custom that a bachelor who is ordained may not marry thereafter, and that only the celibate may be raised to the episcopate was already in place.

The sayings of the councils of Metz and Mainz in 888 and the so called Gregorian reforms on the XIth and XIIth centuries were not actual changes of policy, but affirmations of it, and measures aiming at enforcing it and purging the church of ribald clergy.

The fact that the policy was imperfectly followed, and that even bishops, cardinals and popes had concubines and children well into the 1500s was more a cause of scandal than a mark of acceptability of married clergy... heck, officially authorizing pastors to marry was one of the first things the protestant churches did, as a show of disagreement with Roman practice.

[Hermit]

The Catholic Church ain't a democracy. It's dogma is, according to those in charge, dictated by God. So until God comes along and amends his rules for being a member of the church, those in charge are perfectly justified in sticking with what the rules have been for 2000 years.

Therefore, a Bishop who doesn't believe in church doctrine cannot be a Bishop in the church.

Behold the Seth in full bloom. Looks like you need to be corrected on a couple more of your flights of fancy. Celibacy is not a doctrine, let alone a 2000 year old one. Look at that:

"1 This is a faithful saying: If a man desires the position of a bishop,[a] he desires a good work. 2 A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, temperate, sober-minded, of good behavior, hospitable, able to teach; 3 not given to wine, not violent, not greedy for money, but gentle, not quarrelsome, not covetous; 4 one who rules his own house well, having his children in submission with all reverence 5 (for if a man does not know how to rule his own house, how will he take care of the church of God?)" - I Timothy 3:1-5

From the Wikipedia: "The earliest textual evidence of the forbidding of marriage to clerics and the duty of those already married to abstain from sexual contact with their wives is in the fourth-century decrees of the Council of Elvira and the later Council of Carthage." circa 305 and 390 respectively.

From the Wikipedia again: "Because the rule of celibacy is an ecclesiastical law and not a doctrine, it can, in principle, be changed at any time by the Pope. Nonetheless, both the present Pope, Benedict XVI, and his predecessors, have spoken clearly of their understanding that the traditional practice was not likely to change."

'cept the catholic church does have married priests - so not a matter of dogma. Married RC priests are what you get when married priests in other sects (eg Lutherans, Church of England) decide to join the RCs and are accepted.

Interesting assertion. I'll check it out with my Catholic sources and get back to you.

From the Wikipedia again: "Exceptions are sometimes made (including in Latin Rite Catholicism), granted by authority of the Pope, when married Protestant clergy become Catholic."


No matter, I am happy that the Vatican sees fit to sack a bishop for "suggesting the church consider ordaining women and married men" for the priesthood. If anything could increase the catholic church's alienation from its shrinking number of adherents, it would be that overreaction when contrasted with its systematic assistance to the paedophiles among its ranks in escaping detection and prosecution for their actual crimes.

[Horwood Beer-Master]

The Catholic Church ain't a democracy. It's dogma is, according to those in charge, dictated by God. So until God comes along and amends his rules for being a member of the church, those in charge are perfectly justified in sticking with what the rules have been for 2000 years...

What are you talking about? The catlick church has changed tonnes of rules down the centuries.
However, the pope who first set the rule, and the pope who later changed/abolished it both somehow remain 'infallible', and the always rules remain god's eternal and unalterable rules - even if they've only just made them up.

[Hermit]

the pope who first set the rule, and the pope who later changed/abolished it both somehow remain 'infallible', and the always rules remain god's eternal and unalterable rules - even if they've only just made them up.

Actually, The doctrine of papal infallibility was defined dogmatically in the First Vatican Council of 1870. Proves your point though, in a way: the Vatican makes up or changes rules, including dogma and doctrine, as it goes.

[Xamonas Chegwé]

The Catholic Church ain't a democracy. It's dogma is, according to those in charge, dictated by God. So until God comes along and amends his rules for being a member of the church, those in charge are perfectly justified in sticking with what the rules have been for 2000 years.

If God says no women priests and no married priests, it's not obedience to God to say that the church should defy God and change the rules that God set. Priests, and particularly Bishops, take a vow of obedience to the doctrines of the Catholic church as a condition of being ordained.

Therefore, a Bishop who doesn't believe in church doctrine cannot be a Bishop in the church.

What's so unusual about that?

He can always go be a Lutheran or join some other sect whose doctrines are more in line with his personal beliefs. But he can't expect to remain employed by the Catholic church if he's not towing the party line. The church is an employer and it has a right to demand that its employees show loyalty and fealty to the organizations fundamental beliefs and principles.

It's a private club. If you don't like the rules, go join another club.

Ahem - read the article below and carefully observe the spelling, please.

The Line

When it comes to Grammar nazism, this is the point where I usually reach for my Luger. If I were one tenth as evil as DP, you would have been permabanned and your body encased in ice by now!


Carry on...

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Ahem - read the article below and carefully observe the spelling, please.

The Line

When it comes to Grammar nazism, this is the point where I usually reach for my Luger. If I were one tenth as evil as DP, you would have been permabanned and your body encased in ice by now!

I've got a fiver for you if you do it anyway.

[mistermack]

If you didn't read down the linked article, you missed the REAL reason that he got sacked.

He dealt with a case of abuse by a teacher quickly and honestly, admitting responsibility and looking after the victims.

He stood no chance of keeping his job after such ludicrous behaviour.
He didn't even blame the victims.

[Svartalf]

Mistermack, you're a deplorable moron and a bigot.

While the church likes to sweep scandal under the rug, doing the right thing (which contradicts neither dogma nor official policy) definitely is no motive for dismissal.
For doing that, he would at worst have been made bishop in partibus.

Also, what article do you refer to? I saw no such things in the OP one.

[Hermit]

Mistermack, you're a deplorable moron and a bigot.

That was uncalled for.

Also, what article do you refer to? I saw no such things in the OP one.

Since you missed it, I quote the opening in full, and underline the link for you. Click on it, read it, and then apologise to Mistermack. He was totally correct with his observations.

That'll learn him to think women are in any way equal to men in the eyes of God.

I can understand the Pope's decision, of course, the female priests would have to use strap-ons to bugger little boys, and that's an abomination before God.

[Svartalf]

I had seen that article, but failed to see anything like what he claimed in it... having at last found the passage in question, I maintain the comment, since his action in this regard are definitely NOT cause for being retired from pastoral care, rather the reverse. Ergo, the sanction he suffered came from his unpopular doctrinal position.

Plus, given the actual motives he ascribes to the dismissal, that was a perfectly called for comment, I might add that he seems to be completely ignorant of the workings of the Catholic Church and thus might be better served drinking a hot cup of STFU where they are concerned.

[Seth]

Mistermack, you're a deplorable moron and a bigot.

That was uncalled for.

Also, what article do you refer to? I saw no such things in the OP one.

Since you missed it, I quote the opening in full, and underline the link for you. Click on it, read it, and then apologise to Mistermack. He was totally correct with his observations.

That'll learn him to think women are in any way equal to men in the eyes of God.

I can understand the Pope's decision, of course, the female priests would have to use strap-ons to bugger little boys, and that's an abomination before God.

No, he was not. He was mendacious and fallacious in his observations. There is no evidence whatsoever in the article that his dismissal was for any reason other than his apostate stance on women priests and married priests.

[mistermack]

You've got a very naive view of the catholic church Svartalf.
I was brought up a catholic, and I know very well how they operate. Any instruction that could be contentious is passed down back channels by word of mouth, never written down. But it's still expected to be obeyed.
The golden rule in abuse cases has been to protect the church at all costs. Child-buggering priests are moved on, inflicted on other innocent parishes, not sacked. All to protect the church. Because they now know how big the compensation cases can get.

This Bishop committed the cardinal sin of admitting liability. That's why he HAD to go. Because he might have cost them MONEY !!

Your'e quite right, they couldn't sack him for doing the right thing. So they've sacked him for a SUGGESTION he made FIVE YEARS AGO.

Maybe I am a moron, maybe the pope is a saint. The last one soon will be, and he sanctioned MASSIVE child abuse to protect his precious "church". Such are the saints of today.