Which pope declared celibacy

The law is amended to allow anyone over 18 to buy contraceptives in a chemist without prescription. Leo Varadkar, an openly gay politician of Indian heritage, becomes Taoiseach.

Ireland votes overwhelmingly Legislation is subsequently passed allowing abortion on request up to 12 weeks of pregnancy, and later in cases where the pregnant woman's life or health is at risk, or in the cases of a fatal foetal abnormality. The Amazon synod brought together bishops, Indigenous people and activists from nine countries for a three-week meeting at the Vatican. The issue exploded into the open last month with the publication of a book , From the Depths of our Hearts: Priesthood, Celibacy and the Crisis of the Catholic Church, which included an essay by Benedict.

Amid furore over the book, Benedict later requested the removal of his name as the co-author with conservative cardinal Robert Sarah of Guinea. Although any easing of the celibacy rule was expected to be limited to specific circumstances, traditionalists feared it would inevitably lead to an end to the bar on married priests. Some said the proposal was heretical. The wording of these canons does not immediately suggest that an innovation is being introduced, and it would be an error in historical procedure to maintain a priori that such was the case.

The seriousness of the implications for the life of the clergy, the absence of justification for the strictness of the discipline and the canonical penalty attached, would suggest, on the contrary, that the Church authorities were concerned with the maintenance and not the introduction of this rule. The important papal decretals of the fourth century, which indicate the rule for all the West — Directa and Cum in unum of Pope Siricius; Dominus inter of Innocent I or Damasus?

Yet those who might have been married were thought not to have lived other than in continence? As with other juridical institutions of the Church, with time clerical continence developed sharper and more defined outlines. From the fifth to the seventh centuries much provincial conciliar activity is seen in the West where both the obligation to continence is reaffirmed indicating infringement , and greater precision, taking into account changed circumstances, is given to the law.

Canonical collections would circulate and consciousness of legislating in conformity with a wider legal patrimony and with ancient tradition is sometimes made explicit. One of the interesting features of legislation that appears throughout this period is the implicit or even explicit inclusion of a continent wife among that class of women that c. Cohabitation of husband and wife had been given the explicit backing of papal authority. Leo the Great wrote in « The Byzantine Church, at the end of the seventh century, would interpret this canon as authorizing marital relations.

Continent cohabitation expressed trust in the nobility of human love to combine marital affection with the values of the consecrated clerical state. Paulinus of Nola d. The necessary conditions for this life was a constant concern, Pope Gregory the Great deeming it «harsh and inopportune» durum atque incompetens to expect its observance from the unprepared. Councils also occupied themselves with the details of sleeping arrangements to avoid possible scandal to the faithful. Any direct evidence for rules or customs of marital continence in the East comes from patristic writers rather than from Councils.

However, one must bear in mind the possible implicit presence of the rule in the tradition of the impediment of orders to contracting marriage. The Persian Church which was outside the Byzantine Empire and became Nestorian did, however, legislate, in the late fifth century, explicitly against the practice of clerical marital continence, at the same time authorizing those already in orders to contract marriage. The Council of Mar Acacius , which ratified a similar decision of the Council of Beth Lafath , recognized the antiquity of these traditions of celibacy, but abrogated them, rather than as in the West, try to reinforce them.

The Council did this in an effort to eradicate or regularize clerical incontinence. What would those of Egypt and the Apostolic See do, they who never accept clerics unless they are virgins or continent men, or if they had had a wife, accept them only if they give up matrimonial life Epiphanius , born in Palestine and consecrated bishop of Constantia in Cyprus, condemns all forms of encratism but nonetheless insists that priests themselves are required to live continently, as regulated he believed by the apostles.

Priestly continence is observed, he maintains, wherever the ecclesiastical canons are adhered to, human weakness and the shortage of vocations being inadequate reasons for clergy to contravene the rule. Other testimonies to be taken into special account include Origen d. Caution, of course, has to be exercised in not reading into these texts more than they contain, and one has to recognize that local practices do not necessarily imply a general rule.

Furthermore, other tests need to be considered, such as Clement of Alexandria, Stromata III, 12; Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechesis 12, 25 ; Athanasius, Letter to Dracontius which do not obviously suggest the possibility of a general rule. Indeed, since the end of the nineteenth century such texts have been used to demonstrate the existence of an early general law of continence in the East.

Polemical or confessional interests aside, it can be said that modern tools of scholarship, not available in the past, have allowed doubt to be cast on the certainty of these conclusions too. The only law dealing with continence promulgated at the Council of Nicaea was canon 3, dealing with the categories of women a cleric was permitted to live with.

The famous story of Bishop Paphnutius of Egypt, first recounted by the Greek historian Socrates in the mid-fifth century, relates how at the Council a proposal to impose obligatory clerical continence on all the Churches was opposed by the bishop and then rejected. Canon 10 of Ancyra allows the marriage of a deacon if he makes known his desire at ordination, otherwise it is forbidden.

This exception was not accepted by the Chalcedonian Christian Churches Chalcedon [], c. The background to these laws was the rejection of heretical encratism, and nothing certain can be said concerning the authorisation or otherwise of marital relations in these canons.

Emperor Justinian, on the other hand, considers priestly continence to be the rule, even if it is not always observed. Writing of those clerics who contract marriage after orders, he states: « The Emperor also went further than the ecclesiastical canons in requiring bishops to be without progeny, for fear of alienation of Church property.

It followed Justinian in requiring bishops to be separated from their wives c. This was to be done by common agreement before their consecration, and the wives would enter a monastery where they could become deaconesses c.

The requirement of childlessness was ignored this was abrogated by Emperor Leo VI two centuries later. Widespread ignorance among clergy of the laws governing marriage is acknowledged and traditional discipline re-asserted c. But married priests, deacons and subdeacons are authorized to have marital relations, except during the periods when they serve at the altar c.

With regard to c. The Codex, however, is clearly misinterpreted. The canon from the Synod of Carthage which is quoted had declared perpetual continence The Trullan Synod is regarded in the East as part of the Sixth Ecumenical Council , thus having supreme legislative authority. It has since remained the definitive statement on clerical marriage. Rome, on the other hand, immediately objected to the canons which were against Western discipline and to this day has not accepted them as belonging to the ecumenical heritage.

The Trullan Synod highlights service at the altar as the dominant motive for clerical continence, even if only practised on a temporary basis. Indeed, the patristic theology of the priesthood, stressing its intercessorial and mediatorial function favoured, on scriptural grounds, a connection between dedicated continence and priestly prayer. This also figured prominently in the history of married lay spirituality.

These justified their behaviour by calling upon the example of the Levites of the Old Testament. The swift response was that the Christian priesthood was more than a continuation of the Levitical priesthood — it was its perfection, being spiritual and non-hereditary. Hence the a fortiori case: if the Levites practised temporary continence when in the sanctuary, so much more should Christian priests, always ready to serve, practise continence.

One scriptural quotation notable for its absence in the early texts is the Matthean logion: «eunuchs for the sake of the kingdom» Mt , which is never directly applied to priests. This omission suggests an attitude that priestly continence was not to be considered a voluntary perfection of the priestly state, but rather to be an intrinsic characteristic. It is true that, in the patristic age, the marked sense of the transcendence of God led to an anthropology that relativized many of the values of marriage to the things of this world.

Relative to the things of God, sexual activity could be described in terms that draw on the vocabulary of Levitical ritualism but which offend the linguistic sensibilities of our own time.

Non-monastic priests were expected to be married. From the eleventh century norms appear which prohibit the ordination to the parochial ministry of an unmarried man.

Those celibates who worked closely with the bishop would be unmarried priests who had taken the monastic profession. Those married clergy who became widowers were compelled to leave their ministry and enter a monastery. The Synod of Moscow abrogated this requirement, at the same time authorizing remarriage with reduction to the state of a minor cleric.

Bishops, in keeping with the spirit, if not the letter, of Trullan legislation, were chosen from amongst monastic candidates, although, exceptionally, a celibate layman would be ordained after making monastic profession. More research is needed to understand properly the developments in the non-Chalcedonian Churches under Islamic rule.

It is reasonable to assume, however, that whilst under Byzantine rule imperial legislation was required to be observed. By the High Middle Ages a tradition had developed in the Coptic Church of ordaining children to the diaconate. They were permitted to marry after reaching puberty. The Nestorians, who were outside the Empire, continued from the fifth century to have a married clergy not bound to strict continence.

All Orthodox Churches today have a married clergy. The Eastern Churches in union with Rome followed the norms of temporary continence appropriate to each respective tradition.

The ordination of unmarried men was encouraged by the Eastern hierarchies, bishops also being selected from non-monastic candidates. The discipline of temporary continence has been largely ignored in the twentieth century, presumably because of the assimilation to contemporary Roman Catholic practice of daily Eucharist.

Special decrees have been issued by the Holy See in respect to married clergy outside the territory of origin of their Church, and the present law is found in the Codex Canonum Ecclesiarum Orientalium. From the seventh century to the time of the Gregorian Reform and the legislation of the Lateran Councils, Church authorities made constant efforts to reform clerical mores.

The whole fabric of clerical life, not just the life of continence, was deeply affected by the new social structures and changed conditions that followed the disintegration of imperial organization. The tone of the disciplinary measures taken by the hierarchy was that of conservation and reformation, not innovation. Canonical collections, such as the Dionysiana, were circulated widely, reminding bishops of the discipline of earlier centuries. Some over-zealous reformers skilfully fabricated a number of texts, claiming they had been lost, to add even greater weight to the existing sources.

These formed part of the Pseudo-Isidorian Forgeries ca. They were accepted because of the widely-held conviction that they corresponded to the spirit of traditional legislation.

Their principal weapon was the canonical collections that provided them with their blueprint for how society and church were to be ordered.

These collections included many documents from the patristic period related to our subject. The popes launched a program of reform that, in the name of restoring the authentic past, created something new, especially a papacy with claims of authority far exceeding in theory and practice anything that had preceded it. The reform reached its culmination with Pope Gregory VII , one of the most important popes in the history of the papacy.

The reform movement is named after him. To that extent it was a holiness movement. If this prohibition is to be understood as somehow qualified for those already married before ordination, the limitation is not clear from the text itself. The focus of the reformers was, however, more in accord with the older tradition in that they insisted on continence—absolutely.

Along with other sanctions for incontinent priests, they forbade the laity to assist at the Masses of priests they knew were not conforming to the requirement. They found a good argument for their ideals in Canon 3 of the Council of Nicea , which forbade clerics in major orders to have any women in their households except their mothers, sisters or aunts.

They interpreted the canon, incorrectly, as a prohibition of marriage. With the passage of time, the absolute prohibition of marriage assumed ever greater prominence and gradually became accepted by a seeming majority of lay magnates and the upper clergy as the tradition of the church. In St. Peter Damian, a cardinal and one of the most effective spokesmen for the Gregorian program, wrote his book On the Celibacy of Priests De Coelibatu Sacerdotum , which by its very title helped promote this trend and give prominence to the word itself.

When Bishop Altmann of Passau tried, on the contrary, to implement the reforms, the clergy attacked him and with the help of imperial troops drove him out of his diocese. A cleric, probably Ulrich, the bishop of Imola, took up his pen about in a defense of clerical marriage that assumed conjugal relations after the ordination of the spouse.

But by the time of the Second Lateran Council , the Gregorians had substantially achieved their aims in this regard and won widespread support for them from lay and ecclesiastical leaders. Some bishops gathered for Lateran II. Canons 6 and 7 of that council forbade all those in major orders now including subdeacons from taking wives and forbade the faithful from assisting at the Masses of priests they knew to have wives or concubines.

These two decrees represent a culmination of the reform movement, and, although they might still be interpreted in the older sense of prohibiting marriage after ordination, they came to be understood as absolute prohibitions. From this time until the Reformation, the prohibition of marriage for all clerics in major orders began to be taken simply for granted. The third decisive moment came in the 16th century with the Reformation. Since Luther and the other Reformers found no justification for celibacy in the New Testament, they denounced it as just one more restriction on Christian liberty imposed by the tyrant in Rome.

Luther also argued that celibacy was responsible for the debauchery of the clergy that he found prevalent. He and the other Reformers all married. Although the question of married clergy was not at the center of the Reformation agenda, it in fact gave that agenda an institutional grounding that would serve it well.

These ministers would be a powerful force resisting reconciliation with the traditional church until they could be assured it meant they could bring their wives and children with them as they continued to exercise their ministry. The Reformation was certainly the most massive frontal attack that the traditions of clerical celibacy and continence had ever received.

It had to be answered. The Council of Trent finally took up the matter in the final period of its year history. The theologians deputed to deal with it were divided in their opinions, with a few of them maintaining that celibacy for the clergy was of divine law and could not be abrogated; but most of them held more moderate opinions. The matter was further complicated by political pressure from the German Emperor Ferdinand and Albrecht V, Duke of Bavaria, both devout Catholics who wanted celibacy abrogated.

If that were not possible, they wanted a dispensation from it for their own territories. On July 24, , for instance, Augustin Baumgartner, a layman and the ambassador of the Duke to the council, spoke at length before the bishops arguing precisely along those lines.

The decrees and canons of the Council of Trent run to almost pages in a standard English translation. The council in several places touched upon issues related to our subject, as when Canon 10 of Session 24 condemned the opinion that marriage was better than virginity or celibacy. It issued, however, only one brief canon, a paragraph, that addressed this burning matter directly Canon 9, Session That canon is notably cautious.

It makes no assertions about the origins of the tradition, about its importance or about its necessity. It simply condemns three opinions concerning celibacy: first, that clerics in major orders and religious priests who have made a solemn vow of chastity can validly contract marriage; second, that the regulation of celibacy is a disparagement of marriage; and third, that those who, after making a solemn vow of celibacy, cannot observe it are free to contract marriage.

The canon obliquely reaffirms the discipline of celibacy, but it does not do so explicitly and directly. It would seem to leave open the possibility of exceptions and dispensations. German leaders continued in fact to press their case with Pope Pius IV after the conclusion of the council. His successor, Pope Pius V , left no doubt that the matter was definitively closed.

In the centuries between then and now the issue occasionally surfaced again, especially during the French Revolution, but by and large it has been quiescent within Catholicism until quite recently. John W. The church's obligation of celibacy - or continence, to be exact - goes back to the apostles in an "unbroken" line. The first Church Synod to speak of priestly celibacy met in Elvira, Spain and set out what were called the "traditional" rules.

These forbade bishops, priests and deacons to have sexual relations with their wives and to procreate children. These were the unwritten rules from generations past.

Three recent books provide compelling evidence for this unbroken tradition: Celibacy in the Early Church by Stefan Heid. In a recent year period some 20, priests were lost from ministry; most left for marriage.

Authorities have reported the abuse and rape of nuns by priests in Africa. He told me that every one of his native priests was living with a woman. Chat with missionaries in Latin America and Africa. The abstract ideal does not always become the reality. Bishops in the synods for Asia and for Oceania, short of priests, pleaded to be able to ordain married men.

One told of sending airplanes to islands with consecrated hosts for services. But, he said, that is not the Eucharist. Such enforced silence and deceit will continue to obstruct efforts to resolve the intellectual, emotional and now, after Dallas, canonical chaos we are in. Our authorities seem to be in a state of panic.

In that last diocese, the bishop, faced with a priest shortage, announced that he was importing 12 contemplative Nigerian nuns to pray for vocations! Our beloved church seems to be self-destructing. Since it was not his intention to add any new or original insights, the information he imparts repeats the practice of neglecting to consider the basic role which adverse circumstances played in compelling many early Christians to permanently renounce sexual relations.

Much of the mystery surrounding the emergence of celibacy as a spiritual ideal can be explained by reconstructing the historical realities that were chronically hostile to married and family life in the early church. The unfavorable conditions of severe economic hardship not only exacerbated the woes of marriage but also drove many married couples to sin inadvertently and do serious violence to themselves, their loved ones, and their fellow villagers.

Nowhere is this more evident than in the land of Egypt, the cradle of Christian monasticism. Egypt is a window to the ancient world which makes transparent the forceful role circumstances originally played in inspiring, grounding, and sustaining the celibate way of life.

During the turbulent period of Roman rule, thousands of Egypt's oppressed Christian peasants, as never before in their ancient history, felt deeply inspired to embrace a continent and celibate lifestyle. By not marrying, raising families, and partaking in the usual business of village life, these peasant monks were freed from the obligatory ties of kinship groups and family property and subsequently empowered to practice their faith more perfectly. Through their celibacy they enjoyed a special access to the divine and shared in God's power, wisdom, love, and passion for justice.

They prayed for those in need, held out their hands to the poor, healed the afflicted, gave wise counsel to the distressed, advocated for the powerless, arbitrated village disputes, revitalized their local economies, and promoted a more just social order. As the fame of their virtues spread throughout the Latin Christian world, they captured the imagination of all, inspiring amazement, wonder, zeal, and emulation. Even many centuries later during his convalescence and conversion, Ignatius of Loyola was deeply touched while reading the "Life of Onuphrius" and was filled with desire to do great things in the service of God in imitation of this Egyptian ascetic.

Although most of Egypt's monks were laymen, their ascetic ideals and acts of power made the married clergy look poor by comparison. Their exemplary way of life set the standard by which the early church's clerical leadership was judged. Consequently, many priests were motivated to adopt the monk's celibate life-style. Because the Christian community wanted to endow its priests with the same inner authority and spiritual gifts possessed by the monks, the ecclesiastical decrees and legislation which eventually mandated celibacy for the Western church's ordained ministers received widespread support.

In Egypt the idealization of celibacy arose by force of circumstances.