Akenaton asks if I can explain the reason for the requirement for celibacy for Latin Rite priests in the Catholic Church. Well....keep in mind that I have argued against the celibacy rule and male-only priesthood all of my life; and that I might well be a priest today if it weren't for the celibacy rule. So - I might not be the best person to give an explanation of the celibacy rule. I wouldn't try to explain the male-only priesthood, because I can see no logic in the explanations I've heard.

The practice of celibacy began among monks, who originally lived as hermits. You can see vestiges of this in the movie Into Great Silence. The French Carthusian monks in this documentary live and work in silence in separate buildings, gathering only for prayer and Mass and certain other community activities. Non-contemplative priests and brothers and nuns who belong to religious orders, live and eat and work and pray together in a community house. They consider the community to be their family, and marriage and children and family finances would not work in a religious community structure. Celibacy can work very well in a religious community, and it is an inherent and necessary part of the life of a religious order. There are a few nontraditional religious orders (like the Taize community) that have accommodated married couples and families. Members of religious orders feel they are called to celibate life within a community. It gets really messy if they aren't celibate, and we have seen in the press how disastrous the results can be.

Secular (diocesan) priests take a promise of celibacy when they are ordained, but it is not an inherent part of their priesthood. They do not have the benefit of a religious community to sustain them and to provide family relationships, so the life of a diocesan priest can be very lonely. The rationale is that celibacy frees a priest to serve his community, 24/7/365. There's truth in that - American diocesan priests celebrate Mass every morning, make hospital visits and do office work during the day (with time out for golf), attend meetings in the evenings, and sometimes get up in the middle of the night to administer the sacraments to people who are dying. They work from dawn to dusk on Saturdays and Sundays, and they're quite busy the rest of the week. That kind of life can be very hard on a family - clergymen from other denominations somehow make it work, but that may be because they have a wider base to recruit from because they don't restrict ordination to celibate males only. Non-Catholic clergy typically serve much smaller congregations, so their workload may be such that they can actually have a family life.

I do know some priests who function very well under the rule of celibacy. Typically, they have a good network of friends and a healthy social life - without sex. Oftentimes, they will have one or more close female friends. This can sometimes become a sexual relationship, but then it gets messy. As long as the requirement for celibacy remains in force, a man can't function as a priest and not be celibate. And to be very clear about this, the rule of celibarcy does not allow any sexual contact or fondling - no sex with women, no sex with men, and no sex with children. I would say that priests generally have a fair amount of sympathy for their brother priests who have trouble with the celibacy requirement, and they're likely to tolerate priests having sexual relationships with men or women - at least for a time.

I do not personally know any priests who have any tolerance at all for priests who have sex with children or teenagers. I have worked in the Catholic Church all of my life and I have known hundreds of priests and nuns, many of them very well. I have never, ever heard any talk from priests or nuns that expressed any tolerance for anyone who commits crimes against children.

Most diocesan priests I know follow the rule of celibacy, but they consider celibacy to be an unnecessary burden. They do their best to follow the rule, but they find it very hard. The younger generation of priests are largely very conservative, and they talk about celibacy as being a "gift" - but priests my age largely think they're full of shit.

-Joe-