Paving the way for change

I see these little statements emerging periodically from the Vatican as paving the way for a change in the policy of mandatory celibacy. The latest comes from no less than the Secretary of State for the Vatican, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, who is probably anxious for some good press after his assertion earlier this month in Chile that the pedophilia crisis was related to homosexuality -- a position that was roundly denounced, and not just by homosexual rights groups. In an interview Monday with Catalan public television (TV3), Bertone asserted that while it has been "a positive and productive tradition", celibacy "is not untouchable", noting the existence of married priests in both Eastern and, more recently, Latin rite Catholic churches.

And, coming from the same part of the world, a group of priests from Solsona and Lleida (Spain) who meet as part of the Forum Ondara raised the issue at their April 6th meeting. The group calls for the immediate abolition of obligatory celibacy, noting that while its connection to pedophilia is not conclusive, it has already caused the loss of many good chaplains who could not comply with it as well as discouraging young men from entering the priesthood in the first place. The group argues that Jesus never mandated celibacy and that even though St. Paul encouraged it, it was optional.

In a discussion on Facebook I recently opined that we were one papacy away from married priests and maybe not even that. Several people criticized this assertion but every time things like this come out of the Vatican, I can smell the winds of change.

Married priest finds acceptance

Paul Bickford
Northern News Services (Canada)
Published Monday, April 26, 2010

HAY RIVER - Rev. Don Flumerfelt of Hay River admits some people find it a bit odd that he is a Roman Catholic priest. That's because he also happens to be married.

However, he said his unusual status has been accepted in Hay River and the rest of the South Slave.

"It's been wonderful here," he said, adding there has been no negative reaction.

People recognize his married status in an "affirming way," he said.

Still, some find it odd when, for instance, he tells his wife, Julia, that he will see her for supper.

"They'll say, 'What?'" he said with a chuckle.

Flumerfelt said he and his wife will explain their story if someone has a question.

In essence, the story is Flumerfelt was an Anglican minister for 29 years, including six years in Yellowknife, until he and his wife became Roman Catholics in 2004 and he started studying to become a priest in his new church.

Flumerfelt, 62, was ordained the NWT's first married Roman Catholic priest in early 2007.

Flumerfelt said he had to answer the question of whether he had a call to priestly ministry.

"My answer to that was, 'Yes, I believe so,' and the church affirmed that from the Pope on down," he said. "That's essentially the same call, whether you're married or not."

After being ordained a Roman Catholic priest, he served in Norman Wells before moving to Hay River in November of 2008.

Most of the curiosity about him being married comes from older people, he said. "Those who have known and loved the pre-Vatican II Roman Catholic Church."

Vatican II - the short name for the Second Ecumenical Council of the Vatican in the 1960s - saw some changes in the Roman Catholic Church, including the creation of a process to accept married priests from other denominations.

Flumerfelt said his vows to his wife took place in 1972.

"The first vow is to my wife," he said. "For a celibate priest, his first vow is to celibacy in the church as part of his call."

Flumerfelt doesn't believe married priests in the Roman Catholic Church - and there are many more in Canada and around the world - will erode the tradition of celibacy in the priesthood, and he doesn't believe he is on the leading edge of any big change.

Referring to a verse in First Corinthians, he said the Apostle Paul said it is easier for a single person to serve.

"I have to attest to that fact," Flumerfelt said, adding he has three adult children, including one with a disability.

However, being married has helped in one aspect of service.

"What we're finding is couples are coming to us for counselling and for prayer, and so we're trying to equip ourselves to be more effective in that area," he said.

Flumerfelt had certain conditions - called a Papal Indult - attached to his becoming a Roman Catholic priest.

"What those conditions are intended to do is to say to the greater church that this isn't ordination by the backdoor, but it is honouring priests who have dedicated their lives in celibate ministry," he explained.

One condition is that, if his spouse should die, he would become a celibate priest.

Another condition is that he cannot be a pastor of a parish, but must be an associate priest.

Flumerfelt said it has been a real blessing serving with Rev. Bernie Black as his parish priest.

Overall, Flumerfelt said he is amazed at where he is at this point in his life.

"I'm just so thankful and so is my wife," he said. "It's a real privilege."

Time for church to face up to vocation crisis

Some words of wisdom from Irish priest Fr Kevin Hegarty. Fr. Hegarty has already gained some notoriety for his willingness to speak out on issues affecting the Church. In 1994 he was fired as editor of Intercom for running a series of articles on the sex abuse scandals in the Irish Church, and we all know how that story ended...

by Fr Kevin Hegarty
The Mayo News
4/27/2010

Thankfully, last Sunday has passed. I dread the fourth Sunday of the Easter season. Let me explain.

That day is Vocations day in the Catholic Church. Priests are expected to preach - how I hate that verb anyway - on the need for unmarried men to study for the priesthood.

I once read of a French bishop in the early 19th century who, after he lost his faith, spent one Easter Sunday desperately trying to avoid saying Mass. I have never suffered such a deep crisis of belief but on Vocations day I understand his predicament.

On Vocations day one is supposed to assume that the Catholic priesthood is only for unmarried males. One is expected to extol compulsory celibacy by claiming that it leaves one free, without family interruption, to minister to the parish community. One is directed to justify the exclusion of women from the priesthood on the grounds of tradition and theology, as if tradition has to be set in stone and theology can not be subject to new insights.

I can’t buy into all of that. It seems to me that the exclusive male hierarchical governance of the Catholic Church is out of sync with the insights and impulses of modern society. Such a system is prone to corrosive dysfunction. Its inadequacy has been graphically highlighted by the woeful response to the sexual abuse of children by clergy and religious.

Also, I grew up in a democratic society where respect for freedom of speech was paramount. In my naive student days, in the decade after the Second Vatican Council, an inspirational event, I hoped that the church was ready to embrace the value of this crucial insight. Alas, in recent decades, as the Vatican resiled from the results of the council, the institutional Church has been a cold house for those of us committed to free speech, academic freedom and dialogue. It is a travesty that several liberal theologians have had their licences to teach in Catholic theological colleges withdrawn by Rome.

Some of you might say, get over it. The Church needs priests to continue its mission, so no more agonising. Some of you might even say to me, you joined the army, so march. Sorry, I did not see becoming a priest meant taking on military discipline. If I wanted to be a soldier I would have gone to the other Kildare institution, the Curragh, not Maynooth.

Priests are needed in the Catholic Community to minister to its needs, to share in its joy and pain, to celebrate the rituals of birth and marriage and to give what the poet Thomas Kinsella calls, “ecclesiastical discipline to the shapeless sorrow” of death.

The crisis in priestly numbers in Ireland, looming for some time, is about to happen.

One benign effect of the crisis is that there will have to be greater lay governance of parishes. Parish councils will no longer be toothless bodies, peopled by an acquiescent laity and garrulous and authoritarian priests.

This reform should have happened anyway, according to the Second Vatican Council. Churches, however, will close and there will be a severe decline in religious services. I once heard a bishop glibly say that in the not too distant future priests will operate as an emergency ecclesiastical West Doc type service. Each priest will have to serve a vast territory encompassing several parishes.

I have to say that I find this vista disturbing. As a diocesan priest I live in a parish community, not a religious institution. Here one gets to know the people. They invite you to be part of the significant events of their lives. One makes friends that help to salve the loneliness of the celibate existence. This interchange enriches one’s life and hopefully enhances one’s celebration of the sacraments.

In theological terms it is an incarnational exchange. I fear that much of that will be lost in the projected future.

It seems to me that Church leaders will consider any solution to the vocations crisis except the obvious ones - opening the priesthood to married men and women, not just because of a decline in numbers of unmarried men but because of the rich and creative experience it would bring to ministry in the modern world.

I am reminded of the apocryphal story of the pious man whose life was endangered at sea. He prayed fervently to God for rescue.

A lifeboat and helicopter came to him but he turned them away as he expected a personal envoy from God. He drowned, when to heaven and remonstrated with God for failing to save him. “Well,” God replied, “I did send a lifeboat and helicopter!”

No chance of change in the Church, some of you might say. Maybe I prefer, however, to look at reality rather than whistle past the graveyard.

Let's enlist short-term priests as a long-term solution

A different perspective from Fr. Andrew Greeley, who has studied the priesthood extensively, in the current issue of U.S. Catholic.

I've been doing sociological research on the priesthood for more than 30 years. There are two findings from this research that are beyond question. The first is that priests on the average are the happiest men in the world, happier in their professional and personal lives even than married Protestant clergy. The second is that men are on the average inclined to leave the priesthood (ordinarily) under two conditions: They are unhappy in priestly work, and they want to marry. If they are happy in priestly work and want to marry, on the average they are much less likely to leave.

Note the words on the average in the previous paragraph. My assertions are about the average. There are priests who are miserably unhappy-and unfortunately they set the norm for priestly comments about how low morale is. There are also many priests who love their work but want to marry powerfully enough that they leave the priesthood.

The angry letters that these two paragraphs normally engender are from those who don't read the two paragraphs carefully before they head for the e-mail. Those who don't like these findings are free to do their own research.

I usually follow up these two conclusions with the recommendation that the church experiment with a limited term of service for priests, a kind of priest corps like the Peace Corps (or the Jesuit Volunteer Corps or the University of Notre Dame's Alliance for Catholic Education)...



Full text...

The Priest and the Catechist: Together for Human Rights

The story of the priest who falls in love with the catechist is somewhat of a cliche. Fr. Patrick Rice and Fatima Cabrera's story, captured in the TV documentary Perfumed Killers (RTÉ, 2001), gives it an entirely different twist. Here is the story as told by Dr. Dermot Keogh, head of the History Dept. at University College Cork in Ireland, which gave an honorary law degree to Rice on 6 June, 2008:

Patrick Rice has spent nearly forty years in Latin America working in the area of Human Rights education and in defence of the rights of the families of the ‘disappeared.’ Born in Fermoy in September 1945, he was educated at the local Christian Brothers’ school. He joined the Divine Word Missionaries, studied at St Patrick’s, College, Maynooth, and was ordained in 1970. His order sent him to Argentina as a chaplain to the Catholic University of Santa Fe and as an assistant professor in the Philosophy Department of the same university.

Dissatisfied with his pastoral role, he left the Divine Word Missionaries in 1972 and joined the Little Brothers [Hermanitos] of Charles de Foucauld. After his novitiate had ended in 1973, he became a worker priest in Santa Fe Province serving as part of a pastoral programme to unionise forest workers and agricultural labourers. In 1974, he moved to Buenos Aires, got a job as a carpenter on a building site and lived with the Hermanitos in the shanty town of Villa Soldati.

Following the coup in 1976, the military authorities viewed the pastoral mission of the Hermanitos with great suspicion and many members were forced to go underground. Gross violation of human rights quickly became the hallmark of the new regime. Mutilated bodies were dumped near Villa Soldati, including the cadavers of two Uruguayan members of congress. In all, nearly 30,000 were ‘disappeared’ before the military were forced from power in 1983.

Those working in defence of human rights under the military regime could not count on widespread support in Argentina. Instead of the condemnation of human rights abuses, many people responded to the frequent disappearances with the now infamous phrase – “algo habrán hecho,” or ‘they [that is, those who were ‘disappeared’] must have done something.’ Nobody was safe. The outspoken Bishop of La Rioja, Enrique Angelelli. Patrick, was killed by the military on 4 August 1976. Accompanied by a member of the Fraternity, Patrick made the long and difficult bus journey to the diocese during a ‘state of siege’ to investigate the circumstances in which the bishop had died. Returning to the capital, he continued the investigation into disappearances and helped produce a report “Violence against the Argentine Church” which received international attention. Patrick later described that investigation as his first work in the field of human rights.

Patrick, despite the danger in the capital, kept working openly. His life was changed by the events of 11 October 1976. That night, he left a prayer meeting in his parish in Villa Soldati accompanied by an eighteen-year-old catechist, Fatima Cabrera. They suddenly found themselves surrounded by armed men. They were hooded, bundled into an unmarked car and taken to a secret detention centre where they were tortured over a number of days, sometimes in adjacent rooms or in the same room.

Recalling those events, Fatima wrote recently that there were moments when she had the sensation that she was no longer alive. In Fatima’s own words: Ellos, los militares, eran los dueños de la vida. Their military torturers were the arbiters over who lived or died. But despite their ordeal, Patrick and Fatima did not share the fate of the 30,000 disappeared. Prompt and courageous action by the staff of the Irish embassy in Buenos Aires certainly helped save both of their lives. The then third secretary, Justin Harman, hearing of Patrick’s disappearance, worked with Ambassador Wilfred Lennon, to establish his whereabouts. Now Irish ambassador to Moscow, Mr Harman, who is here today, did not give up. He was the source for a news item in The London Times on 14 October which reported Patrick’s abduction. The following day, the same paper reported an Irish embassy source confirming that he was in police custody but his whereabouts and the reason for his detention were not known. Meanwhile, questions were being raised at the United Nations in New York about the whereabouts of the ‘disappeared’ Irishman.

The military authorities transferred Patrick to a new holding centre. Being over six feet tall, his military guard found it hard to stuff him into the boot of a car. Fatima Cabrera arrived at the same prison a few days later. Both showed the signs of physical abuse and torture. On 19 October, Patrick was shaved by his captors and told that he was to receive visitors. He was also advised, if he did not want to wind up in a sack at the bottom of the River Plate, to say that he had fallen down a stairs. His visitors, the Irish ambassador and Justin Harman, were delighted to see him but distressed by his appearance. They assured him that they would work hard to get him out of jail.

In December 1976, as Patrick was being released from jail his captors asked him to write something positive in their records. He wrote, with characteristic understatement: “I might have been treated better.”

Nearly thirty years later, a fellow prisoner and survivor told Patrick he believed that many of the prisoners in that holding centre were alive today because he had seen them. Therefore, the military were unable to make them ‘disappear.’

On his return to Cork, Patrick was helped make a good recovery by Professor Bob Daly of UCC. And so began a new phase in his life as a campaigner for human rights. In 1976 to 1977, he worked in London with Latin American refugees. He was a founding chairperson of the Committee for Human Rights in Argentina. He went on speaking tours in France, Spain and the United States to denounce torture in Argentina.

Between 1978 and 1980, he moved to the United States and helped found the Washington Committee for Human Rights in Argentina. He lobbied the US Government and Congress on human rights. In 1979, Patrick helped organize with Senator Christopher Dodd a hearing on the ‘Disappeared’ in Argentina. He also worked with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

In 1980, Patrick moved to Caracas, Venezuela, where he lived with a community of the Hermanitos in shantytowns near the capital. He began promoting human rights within the pastoral programmes of the local archdiocese. He also cooperated in assisting refugees from Haiti. In January 1981, Patrick helped organise in Costa Rica the First Latin American Congress of Families of the Disappeared. He became one of the founding members of FEDEFAM (The Latin American Federation of Associations of Relatives of Disappeared-Detainees). He served as its Executive Secretary from 1981 to 1987.

As part of his work with FEDEFAM, he visited most Latin American countries to investigate situations of enforced disappearances and began to lobby actively at the UN Commission on Human Rights in Geneva. He also represented FEDEFAM when, in 1982, it received the Spanish Human Rights award. He did a speaking tour of ten cities in the US organized by the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Foundation, and, accompanied by the mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, received a peace prize.

With the fall of the Argentine military junta in 1983, Patrick returned to Buenos Aires. There he mourned the loss of so many members of his order and their friends. Returning to Villa Soldati, he met Fatima Cabrera. He had last seen her in prison in December 1976. She had, in the interim, spent two years in jail and a further two years under house arrest. Patrick left for Venezuela again, but kept in contact by letter with Fatima. They married in Caracas in May 1985. Two of their children were born in Caracas, and the third, Blanca, when they returned to live in Buenos Aires in 1987. She is here today with her mother.

Living back in Buenos Aires, it was not long before Patrick became involved in human rights training and education at the Ecumenical Movement for Human Rights. He coordinated training courses, seminars and workshops throughout the country. In 1992, he became the national coordinator of that organisation and got involved in prison visitation and assistance to families of the disappeared. He coordinated training courses for teachers in human rights. In 1999, Patrick began to work again with FEDEFAM and was nominated as Senior Adviser to the Executive Committee. He has led a training seminar in Sri Lanka in 1999 organized by the Asian Federation on Involuntary Disappearances. He has participated in the Consultation on Disappearances in Africa, in Benin in 2002. He has attended the General Meeting of Families of the Missing in Croatia in 2002 and Patrick has also taken part in 2003 in consultations with the Office of Forensics and Missing persons in Pristinha, Kosovo.

In 2002, the Irish Diplomatic Mission at Geneva nominated him as the Western Group’s candidate for membership of the UN Working Group on Enforced and Involuntary Disappearances. He participated in much of the advocacy to gain approval for an international instrument against enforced disappearances. That was finally achieved on 23 September 2005.

Over the past forty years, Patrick Rice has been a tireless worker in the field of human rights – as a teacher, educator, activist and lobbyist. For her part, Fatima has had responsibility for running the national adult literacy campaign in Argentina. She now directs the adult literacy campaign in the greater Buenos Aires which has a population of thirteen million.

A few days ago, before leaving Buenos Aires, both Patrick and Fatima were key-witnesses in the trial of a police chief accused of sanctioning a massacre at Pilar, in 1976, in which nearly twenty people were shot. Today in Argentina such testimony is not without danger. Two years ago, another key witness in a similar trial was ‘disappeared’ and is presumed dead. And so the struggle continues. The leading Argentinian poet, Juan Gelman, recalled how his son, Marcello, and his pregnant wife, Claudia, were ‘disappeared’ by the military on 24 August 1976. Both died in a concentration camp and Gelman writes:

The military
dictatorship never officially
recognised their ‘disappearance.’
It spoke of ‘those forever absent.’
Until I have seen their bodies
Or their murderers, I will never give them up for dead.

Juan Gelman’s determination, as reflected in those powerful lines, is shared by Patrick and Fatima Cabrera Rice. They will continue to reclaim the memory of those who have been ‘disappeared’ and never be intimidated into silence.

MORE INFORMATION:

• I fell in love with the girl being tortured in the cell next to me..;, Sunday Mirror, 10/7/2001
  
• Inter-American Commission on Human Rights Case 2450, Argentina
  

Photo: Patrick Rice with his wife Fatima Cabrera and daughter Bianca.

Former priest: Clergy should have right to marry

CNN
3/29/2010

Ed Gerlock has been calling the Philippines his home since he moved there from the United States in 1962 - it was the same year he was ordained.

Ed and Ching Gerlock married in 1981.
The 74-year-old joined the priesthood to initially get an education. It was also a vocation that allowed him to travel overseas.

He spent many years working with the country’s poor and farmers, learning about a life outside the seminary.

It was during this time he met a beautiful Filipino social researcher called Ching. There was an instant attraction, but it was also forbidden. Their friendship grew and so did their love. It took 13 years before Ed would break his vows to the Church and leave the priesthood.

“This lady and I became close friends”, remembers Gerlock. “When I was working in Parish I was thinking to myself… I don’t want to do this for the rest of my life. I genuinely love this lady… in a sense she saved my life”.

They married on May 31, 1981 at a home for leprosy patients in Hawaii. Ching says it was one of the happiest days of her life. Two years later she gave birth to a baby girl they named Alay – which means “a gift”.

Ching says her husband has never turned his back on the church. In fact he still works for those less fortunate and down trodden… caring for the elderly who have no assistance and providing them with services.

She says he may not be able to give mass or wear the cloth of the church, but everywhere they go people still call him Father because of the charitable work he still does.

Their daughter Alay is a guidance counselor. She’s very close to her father and defends his actions 28 years ago. “Most people would say your father took a vow and broke the the vow. But he’s a person, he made a choice and I can’t refute his choice or I wouldn’t be here”.

Gerlock is very progressive and liberal in his views when he talks about the Church and the scandals it’s currently facing. He believes that marriage would be beneficial for priests and that the clergy should at least be given the option of having a marital life.

“When I go to Church and listen to priests talk about reproductive health, marriage and children, I think… what does he know? There are some things in marriage that you would find difficult to talk about and here’s this guy, standing there blandly talking about something he knows nothing about”.

Gerlock doesn’t only believe priests should be married. He also supports gay and women priests; something he knows won’t be happening in the Catholic Church anytime soon. Regardless, he believes reform is essential, if the Church is to repair its battered image.

“It’s going to be a very painful transition I’m afraid”, he admits. “I mean because people are so hard line within the Church. You have to go backwards and say how did this happen – like all the cases of sex abuse that are now coming out. How can we prevent this from ever happening again and what’s our obligation to these children … all those questions are not being address.”

Posted by: Anna Coren, CNN Anchor

22% of priests are married and some are still active

Long time readers of this blog may remember that we covered Fr. Gumersindo's marriage to María Benetti back in January 2007. We are thrilled to see that this clerical couple are together and happy three years later.

by Silvia R. Pontevedra
El País
3/22/2010

Gumersindo Meiriño, born in Cea 44 years ago, entered the seminary at 10, was ordained at 25, then earned a doctorate in theology from the University of Navarre, was pastor of Oseira and Cea, later in A Gudiña, and then went off to the missions. He was in Ecuador and Argentina, and there, in the Diocese of Santo Tomé (Corrientes), he fell in love with Maria Benetti, a lay missionary from Pergamino (Buenos Aires) devoted to the care of patients. At 40, Gumersindo decided to marry her, but he did not leave the priesthood.

He never asked for papal dispensation to return to lay status, so the couple married in the living room of a sports club, in a civil ceremony. And there were many participants (those from A Gudiña even got mad at him because he did not invite them), even though the bishop of Santo Tomé had a letter read in all parishes warning the faithful that whoever went to the wayward priest's wedding would be committing a mortal sin and could no longer take communion. Meanwhile in Ourense, the priest's native diocese, Bishop Quintero asked the faithful to pray that Meiriño, who had already gotten married, would return to the straight path. Now, in Santo Tomé, he does not walk the parishes of the diocese, but he still "feels like a priest" and is still counted in the statistics as a Catholic priest.

Moceop (Movement for optional celibacy), the largest religious group championing the cause in Spain, estimates that of the 27,000 priests in the Spanish diocese over 6,000 are married, though other estimates raise this latter figure to 7,000. It is difficult to be specific, precisely because the Church maintains silence on this issue, but according to these numbers at least 22% of diocesan priests have decided to formalize their relationship with a woman. And some continue to work discretely, with the tacit consent of their bishops. This happens here and in other diocese such as Madrid, also ruled by a Galician, Antonio Maria Rouco Varela.

Twenty-eight seminarians were ordained in Galicia this year. Three or four decades, ago, a single seminary class would have the same number of students. It is logical that diocese are reluctant to give up their soldiers. The lack of vocations and the aging of the clergy are not minor problems for the Church: for each seminarian who is ordained, three priests die. In Galicia, there are 3,863 parish churches (including the 219 belonging to the diocese of Astorga) and only 1,421 priests (28 in Astorga), many of them disabled by age.

When a scandal springs up, as in the recent case of Victorino Pérez, the non-laicized priest from the Diocese of Mondoñedo-Ferrol who continued to concelebrate Masses, the diocese take steps. With support from the Galician priest Manuel Espiña, who just died, Pérez Prieto recently officiated at the collegiate church of A Coruña, considered the second most important church of the Archdiocese of Santiago. Some very Orthodox parishioners had complained about the situation, but the archdiocese did not act until reporters asked about the matter in early March.

An official spokesman denied it at first, but just hours later, the archdiocese released a statement in which it forbade Victorino Pérez Prieto from celebrating or concelebrating Mass in any of the churches in the archdiocese. Three days later, the diocese of Mondoñedo-Ferrol took the same road and announced an investigation.

Victorino Pérez and his wife, Cristina Moreira, have agitated for years for the renewal of the Church, advocating optional celibacy and women priests. This week, Moceop published a statement supporting the couple: "It is sad that the Galician bishops are now jumping on this specific case, when they know that in Galicia, in Spain, in Latin America and in many other parts of the world there are thousands and thousands of priests who are living out a kind of Church in fraternal communities of equals."

In Galicia, there are even cases of priests married to nuns. Celibacy came into the Church three centuries after the death of Jesus of Nazareth with the Council of Elvira (Iliberis, Granada). "Sooner rather than later," according to Moceop, the bishops and the Pope "will have to realize" that mandatory celibacy is "outdated and obsolete." "Many bishops" (the lates -- the one of Vienna -- last week) have called for [a reconsideration of mandatory celibacy] publicly, and "even John Paul II came to acknowledge to a group of journalists that he knew it would be inevitable." In their public letter, the former priests and married priests warn that "the current pedophilia scandal" could put a change in church law on the fast track.

Until that happens, and more so now, given the favorable treatment towards Anglican pastors integrated into Catholicism, there will still be many leading double lives. "Celibacy is oppressive when it is not a charism," says Antonio Martínez Aneiros, a former worker priest, former mayor of Narón, former Galician parliamentarian and a deep believer. Aneiros, who started the process of laicization after spending two months in jail for having officiated at the burial of two workers from Bazán killed in the 1972 protests, recalls that there are studies that put the percentage of priests who violate the celibacy rule at 70%. Some do not even hide the fact, and their parishioners can come to see it as something normal. In a township east of Santiago everyone knows that there is a priest who has had a relationship with a lady for three decades and no one is shocked. The Church (not divine) celibacy law mainly victimizes women, who have to live in silence and who can't even be listed in a partnership registry.

The process of laicization is "hugely traumatic," says Luciano Pena who, while pastor of Portomouro (Val do Dubra), fell in love with a parishioner. "I was tricked from the beginning and it was humiliating for me," he acknowledges; in the interrogations conducted by the vicar, "they asked me to tell my intimacies and eventually, so that they would approve my laicization, I had to tell lies. My rector in the seminary had to make up that I had some kind of defect." With the Church and its "regression in the recent past," this official of the Brión City Council now feels "disheartened". He goes to Mass, but only "to maintain the link" with his neighbors.

Currently, the laicization process is less harsh and quicker (before, it could take "up to 10 years"), but even recently, according to Andrés Muñoz of Moceop, "almost all the questionnaire was of a sexual nature, and only if one declares onself to be obsessed or if one says one has lost faith, is it granted." Then, once returned to the secular state, "former priests become pariahs, and can not return to their parishes." But the low points, after the young priests come in contact with the world, are inevitable: "In the seminaries we learn that women are a danger, the word "pleasure" is forbidden, and the system of discipline, the cilice and the recitation of the breviary have come back," this married priest explains.

Sometimes the pressure is such that it is better to put some distance between. Ángel Álvarez, from Dena, moved to Argentina and conceived his children there. Most are still believers, but others have even left the faith along the way. Domingo Seivane, from Ferrol, was pastor and missionary in Angola, then traveled to France and read forbidden books: "I learned the story of the Church and became an agnostic," he says. Upon returning, he waited until he found employment (as an insurance inspector), and gave the keys to the parish back to the diocese. Under canon law he remains a priest: "I'm not deleting myself from anything," he jokes, "maybe when I die, I will be named pastor again in Heaven."

Photos: Fr. Gumersindo and Maria; Fr. Victorino

Celibacy is destroying church from the inside, says film-maker

Irish Independent
Monday March 22 2010

The director of a film which questions celibacy in the Catholic Church has said that the rule is "destroying the church from the inside".

Film-maker John Deery spent 10 years interviewing priests and seminarians before writing the script for 'Conspiracy of Silence'.

"The release couldn't be more appropriate, given that celibacy is at the heart of the mess the Catholic Church is in now," he said.

Starring Oscar-winning actress Brenda Fricker and actor Sean McGinley, the film tells the story of a young trainee priest torn between the love for his girlfriend and his vocation.

"Celibacy needs to be dropped by the Catholic Church as a prerequisite for being a priest. It's the real problem at the heart of the church," said Mr Deery.

Priest: 'I cannot live this life of celibacy'

By Nancy Haught
The Oregonian
March 23, 2010

PORTLAND — The Rev. Tom Farley looked at packed pews Sunday morning and made a promise.

"There is an elephant in the room," Farley said as Mass began at St. Clare Catholic Church in southwest Portland. "But we'll talk about it later — after Communion. "

He was referring to the letter he'd sent to the congregation last week, which detailed why these Sunday Masses would be his last as a priest.

"I leave because of a private longing in my heart and soul that I have ignored or suppressed to my detriment," he wrote in the letter. "I love priestly ministry but I cannot live this life of celibacy."

Farley, ordained in 1979, is the latest priest to leave the Catholic Church in the United States, which is struggling with a severe clergy shortage and declining numbers. The number of American men joining the priesthood has dropped by 60 percent since the 1960s to about 40,000 in 2009. Celibacy, required since the 12th century by the Catholic Church in the West, is considered a major reason for that decline. Critics say many men reject the priesthood because they aren't willing to live without the intimacy of a life partner or that it leads to sexual frustration and breaking of priestly vows.

The Archdiocese of Portland has about 150 priests, including retired ones, who serve 124 parishes and 24 missions, and about 400,000 Catholics. In the last decade, perhaps half a dozen in the Portland archdiocese have left the priesthood, often quietly, and some have married, also quietly. National numbers of priests who marry aren't reported and tracked.

In a telephone interview Saturday, Farley, who is in his mid- to late-50s, wouldn't discuss leaving, except to say it was a "gut-wrenching" decision.

Parishioners packed Farley's last Masses — one Saturday evening and three on Sunday morning. As part of the services, the congregations knelt with him to confess their sins and listened as he preached a brief sermon. After Communion, Farley carried a sheet of paper to the lectern and read:

"I want to say how honored I have been to be a fellow disciple with you in the Catholic Church. I am leaving without anger or resentment, not wanting to hurt you or the Church. I do not want to be a poster child for married priests."

Farley, who graduated from high school in Corvallis, said he will live in Portland. He drew chuckles when he said he would be looking for a job, "like a real person." He said he will remain a practicing Catholic. He can still receive the sacraments, but if he chooses to marry in the church, he must go through a process to be released from his vows.

Meanwhile, he said, "I look forward to parish shopping — like you have been able to do."

The Rev. James Galluzzo will return as interim pastor at St. Clare. The archdiocese is expected to assign a new priest to St. Clare in July.

After Mass, parishioners said they were stunned by Farley's letter. It sparked speculation about marriage in Farley's future, but most were still focused on what the priest had brought to the parish, and the legacy he would leave.

"He was one of us," said Frank Elliott, who was baptized as an adult by Farley. Farley also married Elliott and his wife, Kathleen, and baptized their two daughters.

"He was part of our family," Kathleen Elliott said through her tears. "Always, in his sermons, he brought the message to life. He took his family stories and translated the Gospel in a meaningful way."

Other church members felt the same. "I can't imagine this parish without him," said Michael Spatz, a member of St. Clare's since 1989. "He's been a good match. This is a liberal parish with clear ideas about social justice. He didn't just put his stamp on us; he allowed us to put our stamp on him."

Linda Fanning, who remembers that her first day at St. Clare coincided with Farley's nine years ago. "Father Tom is man of huge integrity. He does what he says he's going to do." Neither Spatz nor Fanning would talk about the issue of celibacy at the core of Farley's letter or about his plans. "He's doing what's right, following the rules set out for him," Fanning said.

Mary Alice Judy said she drives 15 miles to attend Mass at St. Clare — because of Farley's homilies. "It always seemed like they spoke to me directly," she said. "They were short, obviously well-prepared." She said she'd heard some speculation about whether Farley would marry anytime soon.

"I certainly hope so," she said. "Loneliness is terrible."

Celibacy and Sex Abuse

The latest rounds of child sex abuse scandals in the Catholic Church in Ireland, Austria, Germany, The Netherlands, and Brazil (caught on video and aired on a Brazilian TV station), among other places, have led several prominent Catholics to call for an end to the celibacy requirement.

Among the voices:

• Theologian Hans Kung who, commenting on the latest rash of sex abuse cases, asks “Why is it so prevalent in the Catholic Church under celibate leadership?” and opines: “Compulsory celibacy is the principal reason for today’s catastrophic shortage of priests, for the fatal neglect of eucharistic celebration, and for the tragic breakdown of personal pastoral ministry in many places.”
  
  
• Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, Archbishop of Vienna, who called for celibacy to be reexamined and then was pressured by the Vatican to "clarify" his remarks and indicate that he still supported celibacy.
  
  
• Bishop Hans-Jochen Jaschk of Hamburg, Germany, spoke about the issue on German radio: "The celibate lifestyle can attract people who have an abnormal sexuality and cannot integrate sexuality into their lives. That's when a dangerous situation can arise."

Meanwhile, Pope Benedict XVI has continued to defend the celibacy rule calling it the sign of full devotion, the entire commitment to the Lord and to the 'Lord's business', an expression of giving oneself to God and to others". The official Church position is that celibacy has no relationship to sexual abuse of minors. I, Rebel Girl, actually agree with the Vatican on this point, although I believe that celibacy should be made optional for other reasons.

Finally, Univision posted a survey today asking viewers whether the Vatican should eliminate the celibacy requirement. If you can understand Spanish and want to vote, click here.

Priests with love lives speak out against celibacy

By ANGELA CHARLTON and VICTOR L. SIMPSON
Associated Press
3/17/2010

PARIS — Leon Laclau shared his life, and often, his bed, with Marga over 20 years — all while serving as a Catholic priest in a town in the French Pyrenees.

His clerical leadership eventually expelled him, prompting protests from his flock and inspiring other priests and their partners around France to speak out about long-hidden love lives, and to press the Church to abandon its insistence on celibacy.

They say the chastity rule has fed the persistent, profound decline in the numbers of European and American priests. More influential voices are joining them as scandals involving sexual abuse and pedophilia spread across parishes around Europe.

The Vatican rejects any link between celibacy and sex abuse and shows no sign it intends to loosen its rules. Instead, church leaders are likely to continue a don't ask-don't tell policy of ignoring priestly relationships, as long as they cause no harm.

"Love, my love for Marga, never held me back from having faith. On the contrary, it encouraged me," Laclau told The Associated Press by telephone from his home in Asson, in the mountains near the pilgrimage site at Lourdes. "I lived my love life with Marga, and I kept my passion for the church."

The two met when Laclau led the funeral service for Marga's first husband in 1985. When their relationship blossomed, he said, "at first, we tried to hide it."

Slowly their friends learned, and Laclau's church colleagues, who met them "with a silence, not of disapproval, but of non-interference," he said.

The church's quiet tolerance melted when Marga came to live with Leon in 2001. Laclau's superior, Father Benat Oyhenart, asked him to "purify the relationship" — in essence to choose between his vocation and his love.

Laclau chose Marga. In 2007, he was forced out of the priesthood.

Oyhenart sent a statement to the congregation explaining what he had done. "What about the young groom who says, 'How can I commit to the sacrament of marriage, for the rest of my life, before a priest who himself does not respect the commitment he made for the rest of his life?'"

Oyhenart received angry, fearful letters from churchgoers. One he cited read: "If you replace him, I will keep my children at home, out of fear that his replacement is a pedophile."

Such fears have mounted as revelations about sexual abuse of children have convulsed Catholic leadership from the United States to Ireland to Australia and in recent weeks, Germany, the Netherlands, Austria and Switzerland.

Now, one of the pope's closest advisers, Austrian Cardinal Christophy Schoenborn, has called for an honest examination of issues like celibacy and education for priests to root out the origins of sex abuse.

His office quickly stressed that Schoenborn wasn't calling celibacy into question, just as Pope Benedict XVI was reaffirming its importance as an "expression of the gift of oneself to God and others."

Theologians and psychologists warn against equating celibacy with pedophilia, at least directly.

But Schoenborn and others have been receptive to arguments that a celibate priesthood is increasingly problematic for the church, primarily because it limits potential candidates for ordination.

Another problem: People who are pedophiles to begin with are drawn to the church because it is an easy way to find victims and be in a position of authority where few question their actions, priest and family counselor Stephane Joulain noted in an essay in Sunday's Le Monde. He also said priests who have never had sexual experiences are often drawn to adolescents because their own sexual growth halted at adolescence.

Laclau, after his experience, says that "an end to celibacy is not the only answer" to the church's woes. He blames "young, reactionary priests ... who show a growing traditionalism" for alienating ordinary believers who might otherwise have been drawn to the priesthood.

While the worldwide number of priests is slowly rising to 408,000 — with major growth in Africa and Asia — the number in Europe is continuing to decline, according to Vatican statistics.

The decline is particularly jarring in the United States, where they have dropped from 58,909 in 1975 to 40,666 in 2009, according to the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate, Georgetown University.

France is down to about 24,000 priests nationwide from 42,000 in 1975, and numbers of churchgoers have plummeted. A study by Lyon's auxiliary bishop found that more than half of the 161 priests who left their jobs between 1996 and 2005 did so to join romantic unions with women or other men, according to Catholic newspaper La Croix.

"The church is losing a lot of ground, it's turning in on itself," Laclau said. Ending celibacy, while not the only solution, could help make the church "more humane," he said.

Two days after leaving the church, he received a letter from a former parishioner describing being sexually abused as a child by another priest, a kind of cry for help.

"It repulsed me. It stains religious life, this kind of perversion," he said.

Evidence over the past decade has shown church leadership has covered up, ignored or simply underestimated the problem of pedophilia.

Before becoming pope, then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger told Catholic News Service in December 2002, that "less than 1 percent of priests are guilty of acts of this type." The most extensive study of the abuse crisis in the American church, commissioned by the U.S. bishops in 2004, found that about 4 percent of all American clerics who served during the time studied were accused of abuse.

The percentage in society at large is unknown because studies are inconclusive.

The report stressed that neither celibacy nor homosexuality causes abuse, but argued that an understanding of the problem of clerical sex abuse isn't possible without reference to both, since the vast majority of U.S. abuse cases were of a homosexual nature.

In Italy, papal biographer Marco Politi, in his book "La Confessione" — "The Confession" — presents the testimony of a priest struggling to balance his homosexuality with his commitment to a church that considers homosexual acts a sin.

The priest, who is never identified, discloses that a network of homosexual priests is active in the Italian church. It is described as an informal "self-help group" that lives in the "catacombs" of the church — the underground.

For Laclau, the solution is more sexual honesty among the clergy.

"I thought I was one of the very few (priests) to have a love life. I slowly discovered how numerous we are," he said.

Groups around Europe have sprung up to bring together people like him, from the Belgium-based Married Priests association to a group called Plein Jour, or Light of Day, which includes some 150 Frenchwomen who live with priests.

Many have borne the priests' children. Many maintain a low public profile, but seek solace in sharing their stories with other women who have lived the same "suffering, silence, sacrifice," said the group's director, Dominique Venturini.

Venturini, now 85, spent 45 years romantically and sexually involved with a priest based in Provence. "Only when he retired could he come and live with me. But unfortunately, by then, it was too late to have children, a dream I always had."

She speaks bluntly against celibacy. "When you bury human nature, it figures out how to express itself in another, perverted way."

Under church law, the pope can change the celibacy requirement by fiat, although some in the church have suggested that various reforms be discussed in a wider forum such as a new Vatican council.

However, the Rev. Thomas Reese, an American expert on the Vatican, said he doubts there would be a majority vote at such a forum to lift celibacy. "In addition, too many dioceses in the southern hemisphere have resolved the issue by simply ignoring ongoing relationships between priests and women," in said in an email exchange with The Associated Press.

The Catholic church's Eastern rite, which follows Orthodox Christian traditions but is loyal to the pope, allows married priests in contrast to the Roman church.

The Rev. Igor Yatsiv, spokesman for Ukraine's Greek Catholic church, said he knew of no cases of clergy sex abuse.

"I am not sure that's just because of no mandatory celibacy here. I'm married myself and have three children, but I don't think it's this that keeps me from sin. I just don't know another way" of living, he said.

Leon and Marga Laclau, after he left the church and after more than 20 years together, finally married. He continues to attend Mass, "not regularly, but I go. It is always a joy to participate."

"I still have faith," he says. "But you must maintain it. It's a bit like love."

Simpson reported from Rome. Associated Press writer Fanny Dassie in Paris contributed to this report.

Catholic Church Loses an Exorcist

According to today's Crítica de la Argentina, on of the Catholic Church's few certified exorcists, Fr. Gastón Dedyn, has left the priesthood to get married and, on Sunday, will be ordained as a Lutheran pastor.

"They used me, they mistreated me, and that's why I left," says Gastón Dedyn, one of the few priest-exorcists in the worldwide Catholic Church, who is now obliged to change his life. He has just decided to leave the priesthood to marry Laura, a woman he fell in love with three years ago. But he will not leave the ministry. This Sunday he will become a member of the Lutheran clergy in Argentina, after leaving the institution with its headquarters in Rome because of its strict celibacy.

At 61, this priest, who has spent more than half his life consecrated to God, states that his priestly vocation "is intact", but that the humiliation to which he has been subjected by the church leadership made him feel "like Uriah, the Hittite." The biblical comparison refers to the story of the soldier husband of Bathsheba whom King David ordered killed on the battle front after having impregnated his wife.

Dedyn -- who fulfilled innumerable roles of high responsibility during his priestly life -- reached a breaking point when he fell in love and formed a couple with a woman. That situation caused his separation from the Catholic Church.

Father Gastón was professor of Spirituality at the seminary in Paraná, rector of the “Santa María Madre Dios” seminary in the Diocese of San Rafael, Mendoza, vicar general and diocesan administrator and a well-known exorcist authorized by the Vatican.

– When did you begin to perform exorcisms?, Crítica de la Argentina asked.

– I've been doing exorcisms since 1998, when I had to face a woman possessed by a demon for the first time. I have taken evil out of the bodies of many people, over one hundred, through what we call diagnostic exorcism.

- And what is it like to deal with a possessed person?

- Very intense, their eyes turn white, their voices change, they vomit, they develop an uncommon strength.

- Like in the movie "The Exorcist"?

- More or less. They don't turn their heads 180 degrees, but everything else is basically the same. It's terrifying to carry on a conversation with the demon to convince it to stop bothering a person, but with the power of Christ everything is possible.

LOVE. Laura is 47 and she is the woman who changed Dedyn's life. "I met her in Baradero three years ago and we fell in love, I was already fairly upset by everything that was happening to me with the church authorities, I had even had an argument with my bishop where I raised the fact that I could not continue to bear the injustices to which I was being subjected, but it was this love that led me to decide to separate myself," the priest says. And he adds: "I always dreamed of having a huge family. Imagine, I come from one with 11 brothers and sisters and 42 nieces and nephews, and I would love to have children, but we will have to adopt."

According to a survey Dedyn himself took of his parishioners, a substantial majority agree with his decision. Given his friendship with Bishop Manuel Acuña, head of the Independent Lutheran Church of Argentina, he decided to join this new institution, in the Good Shepherd parish, in the Santos Lugares area of Buenos Aires.

"Father Gastón is a Catholic priest who has asked to serve as a minister in our Church, channeling his vocation, after having discovered the affection given by a woman who is now his wife. Father Gastón, being a priest forever and understanding that human love enriches his service to his neighbor, did not find room in the Roman Catholic Church to continue, given the celibacy requirement," Acuña explains.

A special service naming Father Gastón as an official member of the Lutheran Church will take place on Sunday March 14th at 10 am in calle Sudamérica 1712, in Santos Lugares. Perhaps some of the people he exorcised will be present.

Photo: Fr. Gastón Dedyn, Bishop Manuel Acuña, and their spouses.

Spanish Bishops Conference defends decision to dismiss MOCEOP supporter from teaching post

Rentapriest Blog covered the case of Jose Antonio Fernandez back on June 20, 2007. The story — and the struggle — continue....

Mar Ruiz
Cadena Ser
2/19/2010

La Cadena SER has had access to a letter presented by the Bishops Conference in the Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. It is the first time that the Spanish Church goes to Europe to defend its power to dismiss teachers for "moral standards".

The Court, whose decision will set precedence, will decide on the case of Jose Antonio Fernandez, a former priest who was dismissed by the Diocese of Cartagena for attending a meeting of the optional celibacy movement (MOCEOP). Jose Antonio Fernandez had been hired six years earlier by the diocese when he was already married and had five children.

The letter, to which Cadena SER has had access, is signed by the Secretary General of the Bishops Conference, Juan Antonio Martínez Camino, and it reflects the "direct interest" of the church hierarchy in this proceeding because, as it states, it is the Church's role to recruit teachers of religion and establish the moral criteria to determine the suitability of these teachers to teach the subject. The bishops also refer to the independence and freedom of the Catholic Church in the matter and the non-interference of the state in the regulation of its internal affairs.

The case is the culmination of a legal battle initiated by José Antonio Fernández in 1988 when the Diocese of Cartagena fired him from his post as professor at an institute in Mula (Murcia). He had been teaching for over six years there. The diocese, as well as the center faculty and all students were aware of his condition as an ex-priest who is married with five children. However, his attendance at a meeting of MOCEOP, as a member of the general public, was what led to his dismissal. After losing the case before the constitutional court, Fernandez is now exhausting the judicial avenue by asking for redress from the European Court of Human Rights. Speaking to Cadena SER, he asserts that that he is only asking for justice and an acknowledgement that his dismissal was invalid. He also condemns the hypocrisy of the church hierarchy because when he was hired they knew his status as a married ex-priest.

The Strasbourg ruling will set precedent and take full effect in Spain, which, in the case of a resolution favorable to the plaintiff, would be critical to the many claims of invalid dismissal presented by teachers of religion in Spain.

Married Catholic priest will be Nashville diocese's first

By Bob Smietana
Tennessean
1/21/2010

Prentice Dean will be ordained as a Catholic priest on Monday — while his wife watches.

The former Episcopal priest and father of two will become the first married priest in the Nashville diocese.

He resigned from the Episcopal Church because he thought the denomination had moved away from traditional Christianity. He converted to Catholicism five years ago, and, after Monday, he'll be celebrating Mass, hearing confessions and handling all the responsibilities of a priest.

Since the 1980s, the Roman Catholic Church has allowed former Episcopal priests, like Dean, to be ordained under a special provision. Church leaders say the provision is an act of grace toward converts. But some wonder why that same grace isn't extended to former Catholic priests who left the ministry to marry.

Right now, about 100 married former Episcopal priests have been ordained. Still, the vast majority of the more than 40,000 priests in the United States are celibate.

The tradition of celibacy is rooted in the Bible. Jesus never married, and the Apostle Paul told the Corinthians that marriage is a distraction from serving God.

Eventually, Christians were divided on the issue. Greek-speaking Christians allowed priests to marry before they were ordained. Latin-speaking Christians, on the other hand, required celibacy.

That split continues today. Roman Catholics from the Latin rite tradition, which includes most of the world's Catholics, require celibacy. But Eastern Rite Catholics allow married men to become priests, as do Orthodox Christians.

Bishop David Choby of the Diocese of Nashville supports Dean's ordination but he believes that it's difficult for a minister to be both a husband and a good pastor. That view is based, in part, on his conversations with Protestant ministers.

"They've told me at times that they felt torn between the needs of their family and the needs of their parishioners,'' Choby said.

John Allen, senior correspondent for the National Catholic Reporter, said the debate over married priests continues among Catholics. "It's always on a slow boil," he said.

Clergy couples: Overcoming the odds to find mutual understanding and love

By Jeff Brumley
Florida Times Union
12/12/2010

...
The Revs. Davette and Richard Turk: God and love helped them overcome the odds

If there ever seemed to be an impossible romance, it is that of the Revs. Davette and Richard Turk.

For starters, he was a Catholic priest and she a Catholic nun when they first met in 1973. As such they were both forbidden to marry.

Making matters even more difficult, their first encounter went badly when Richard asked Davette to prepare a ministry document for him.

"He said, 'Just type it up.' I said, 'There's a typewriter, type it yourself,' " said Davette, 76. "He couldn't believe it. Smoke was coming out of his ears."

"I didn't like her," Richard, 70, added.

But over time they overcame that difficult first encounter and grew closer as they worked together in social justice ministry in Roman Catholic Diocese of Trenton, N.J.

"I realized I was in love with her, and I knew I could not love her and remain a Roman Catholic priest," Richard said.

Davette realized the same. Both left Catholicism for the Episcopal Church, where Richard's ordination was accepted. Davette was ordained a priest a decade after their wedding in September 1975.

"We both maintained our vows of celibacy until we were married," Richard Turk added.

They've raised two kids and have served parishes in the Jacksonville-based Episcopal Diocese of Florida since the 1980s. And though retired from active church ministry, Richard helps lead services at the Church of Our Savior in Mandarin and teaches college courses. Davette is known for her interfaith and race relations work in the city and offers spiritual direction to other clergy.

For those who are curious, Richard said no, they do not hear each other's confessions, and they are not each other's personal pastors.

"And we don't throw Scripture at each other" during arguments, he said.

But they do worship together and pray together every day, which Davette said has helped stoke the flames of love during their 34 years of marriage.

Which is why Davette said she's expecting royal treatment on Valentine's Day.

"We are as romantic, if not more romantic, than when we first got married," she said.
...

Priest calls for debate on celibacy and women priests

By Fintan Lambe
New Ross Standard (Ireland)
Wednesday February 10 2010

A priest who is taking time out from his ministry to 'consider his future' has called for a meaningful debate on the issue of married priests and women priests.

In a frank and open interview this week, Fr. Tommy Conroy said he was taking time out to decide on his future, mainly because of the pressure of the workload and the loneliness of clerical life.

He said his reason for speaking out was not to be critical of the Church, but rather to encourage debate on the future direction of the Church in Ireland.

A Craanford native, Fr. Tommy went straight from second-level education to studying for the priesthood at St. Peter's. He was ordained at the age of 25, and spent two years as a curate in Portarlington, Co. Laois, before being posted as chaplain to Gorey Community School. He remained there for 17 years, but, last September, was appointed to work in the parish of Gorey and Tara Hill. However, he kept up some of his duties at the school.

'The challenge of working in the three places was too much for me,' he said this week. 'I felt completely overburdened, and I felt I was running around a lot.'

'I'm taking time out, but I do hope to return to the Community School in September,' he explained.

News of his move from working at the school full-time last September caused the students to organise a petition to keep him there. His straight-talking demeanour, and his ability to relate very well to the students, had proven popular with both students and staff alike. 'I didn't waffle or preach to the students. I just said it as it is,' he said.

However, the transition to parish life presented its own challenges. The workload in a parish can be very demanding.

'For those that actually work, it's a mission impossible, and there's very little lay involvement to lessen the load,' he said. 'The Church has to face up to two things. I think they have to face up to a married priesthood, and I can't understand why the Church is not open to women priests as well.'

'I'd like a debate. I can't understand why it's not being debated and why people are not asked for their opinion,' he continued. 'I've always said these things, but it seems that it doesn't carry much support.'

Life as a priest can also be lonely. He said that he had a good circle of friends in the Community School, but when he moved out into the parish, things changed when he was seen out and about in social circles.

He added that rumours about him had started to go around the town. 'There were all sorts of rumours, but none of them are actually true,' he said. 'I do find it hard that you can't have friends without insinuations being made. If you're ever seen talking to a woman in public, it's automatically assumed something illicit is going on.'

'I had a good circle of friends for 17 years in the Community School, and there was never an issue, but the minute I stepped outside of it, it appeared to become a huge issue,' he added.

He said he would take a year out to consider his future. 'I suppose you could say I'm at a bit of a crossroads,' he admitted. 'The pressure of work has increased the sense of isolation and loneliness. You're just running all day and you're wondering what you're really achieving.'

He believes the Church too is at a major crossroads. 'Until they give the laity their proper role, things are going to get harder,' he contended. ' Basically they should play a role in decision making. They need to be challenged more to use their gifts. There are a lot of things they could be doing in the community. That's their role as baptised members of the Church.'

He said that the issues of allowing priests to marry, or women priests, are never discussed at bishops' meetings or deanery meetings. 'As priests get scarcer, are they going to run us into the ground until the last one is gone?' he asked.

He doesn't believe the sexual abuse scandals in the Church have made it harder for him to be a priest. 'I've always looked at the bigger picture. Obviously they disgust me, and the manner they have been handled disgusts me even more, but I've kept looking at the bigger picture. I've dealt with so much abuse that takes place in the community at many different levels over the years.'

He hopes his future will include working with young people. He spoke openly about his reasons for taking time out at a recent Mass, and received huge support from local parishioners.

'There's a huge amount of appreciation for whatever bit I've done over the years,' he said. 'But the challenge was too big for these shoulders.'

'I'm still a priest, and I have absolutely loved it. I put my heart into it and I have enjoyed myself immensely. 'I'm hoping for a measured debate now. At least let's start discussing the issues that affect priests or the ministry.

'We are born on our own, and we die on our own. It's beyond my understanding why priests have to have such a solitary life.' Just last year, one of the youngest priests in the Diocese of Ferns left to consider his future.

Fr J.J. Doyle, who was curate in Ballymitty, successfully applied for discernment, and left to take time out and consider his vocation and future within the Church.

His decision came around the same time that Fr Noel O'Brien said his final Mass in Templeudigan, before leaving the priesthood to get married in Florida.

Fr O'Brien said he was leaving the priesthood as he wanted companionship in life, having found the priesthood lonely.

73% of Belgian Catholics support married priests

The Beligian newspaper, Le Soir, this week published the results of its survey of Catholics and their beliefs and practices in that country in a series of articles under the general title "The Jesus Crisis". Among the findings: 73% of Belgian Catholics now support allowing priests to get married. This is up from 66% in favor of abolishing mandatory celibacy in 2005.

The survey also finds the same disconnect on issues of sexual morality and "life" between Catholic laity and the Magisterium that has been noted in surveys in other countries:

• Only 1% of Catholics surveyed said that they always follow the teachings of the Church to the letter in sexual matters while 48% said that they "never" follow the Church on these issues
  
• 90% of Catholics surveyed supported the use of artificial contraceptives
  
• 61% supported euthanasia
  
• 39% were tolerant of abortion
  

All of which may explain the most dramatic finding in the survey and one which should give the Church in that country pause: one out of three Beligian Catholics has abandoned the faith. While 87% of those surveyed were born into Catholic families, today only 60% still consider themselves Catholic. According to the survey, the percentage of Belgians who consider themselves Catholic has been steadily declining from 72% in 1980 to 68% in 1990 to 60% today.

Postcard Campaign for Optional Celibacy

Supporters of this blog should click on the link and join in this electronic campaign. The e-postcards go to Cardinal Claudio Hummes with an optional copy to your local bishop...

Local group wants Catholic priests to be allowed to marry
By Ken Robinson,
Newsradio WTAM 1100
Sunday, January 24, 2010

(Cleveland) - A Lakewood-based organization called FutureChurch.org has started an electronic campaign to make priesthood celibacy optional for Catholics.

Sister Christine Schenk says their site has sent more than 3,000 postcards urging catholic leaders to discuss the concept.

Schenk explains that the move toward celibacy only started in the 16th century and throughout most of Catholic history, priests were allowed to marry.

Schenk contends that married priests have a better concept of how to live a Christian life. She says one of the main reasons behind the current priest shortage is the desire of men to have a family.

A 2005 gallop poll indicated that 75% of Catholics were open to having married men ordained as priests.

Schenk says her group would also like begin discussions about the ordination of women.

Priests in Puebla Dismissed Over Children

UPDATE 1/6/2010: Eugenio Lira Rugarcía, spokesperson for the Archdiocese of Puebla, has issued a communique clarifying that four priests have been dismissed and that they are also suspended a divinis. On a more interesting note, Cambio reports that Rugarcia suggested that once the priests have fulfilled their obligations as fathers of minor children, they could ask to be returned to the priesthood though, he said, this seldom happens. And, in a further development, La Jornada de Oriente reports that the Jesuit rector of the Universidad Iberoamericana, David Fernández Dávalos, has offered his opinion that it is time for the Church to end mandatory celibacy for priests which he describes as a source of disenchantment for the faithful. “It is necessary to review whether it is appropriate for celibacy to continue to be practised in the Catholic Church, because it is not linked to any revelation, it is not in the gospel. The obligation of celibacy has been imposed since the 12th century. It is a human law that can be ended at any given moment. The religious [monastic] life in which one voluntarily accepts a way of life freely, without having the commitments of a family or partner, is something else."


Several priests in the Archdiocese of Puebla, Mexico, have been dismissed from their parishes over the last year after the archbishop, Mons. Víctor Sánchez Espinosa, learned that they had fathered children. The exact number of priests who have been dismissed varies in the news accounts on the subject. Milenio claims three priests are involved; El Sol de Puebla says four. The reports are also contradictory as to whether the priests have also been suspended a divinis or not...

Uganda Catholic Priests Form New Church

I post these stories not because I approve of creating separate schismatic Catholic sects but simply as a warning: as long as the Vatican does not allow Catholic priests to marry, more and more of these sects will emerge. Let's pray that the new year brings a real change in policy and not just the admittance of a few more disgruntled married Anglicans into the RC priesthood. -- RG

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
New York Times
Published: December 31, 2009
Filed at 3:26 p.m. ET

KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) -- Twenty renegade Catholic priests who are either married or want to marry have broken from the mainstream Roman Catholic Church here and formed a new church where celibacy is not required, members said.

The Ugandan government said Thursday it was investigating the breakaway Catholic Apostolic National Church in Uganda and would ban it if found to be illegal. Vatican officials said the priests were now considered ''outside'' the Catholic Church and would likely be excommunicated.

The creation of the splinter church underscored the increasingly vexing problem of enforcing celibacy for Roman Catholic priests in Africa, which has the world's fastest-growing Catholic population but where there have been several cases of priests living openly with women and fathering children.

Earlier this year, the Vatican summoned African bishops to Rome for a three-week meeting on problems of the church in Africa, and celibacy was a key topic of discussion. The Vatican, however, has remained firm that priests must not marry, although there are exceptions for priests of the Eastern rite and for converts from Anglicanism.

The breakaway Ugandan church has as its head a former Zambian Catholic priest, the Rev. Luciano Anzanga Mbewe, who was excommunicated earlier this year for having founded what the Vatican called a schismatic church, the Catholic Apostolic National Church of Zambia, which allows for a married priesthood.

The Ugandan offshoot is located in the eastern town of Jinja. Mbewe is expected to visit soon to officially launch the church and ordain new priests, said Rev. Leonard Lubega, who says he has been appointed bishop-elect by Mbewe.

Mbewe has said he was inspired by the former Zambian archbishop, Emmanuel Milingo, who was married in 2001 to a South Korean woman by the Rev. Sun Myung Moon of the Unification Church.

Milingo was excommunicated in 2006 after installing four married men as bishops in the United States. Two weeks ago, the Vatican defrocked Milingo entirely, stripping him of his priestly functions so any future ordinations by him would be invalid.

Lubega said the Catholic Apostolic National Church in Uganda already has over 12,000 followers.

''We are Catholics but not Roman Catholics,'' Lubega said, adding that the new church -- while not under Pope Benedict XVI -- recognizes him and prays for him.

At least three of the priests have said they are married. One is Rev. Henry Mutto, who said he recently got married. ''Some of us already have wives. Others will get (one) soon,'' he said.

Uganda's vice president, Gilbert Bukenya said authorities were investigating the church, which he called a sect.

''We want to know its roots. If we discover that it is illegal we will ban it,'' he said.

Archbishop Cyprian Kizito Lwanga, the Roman Catholic archbishop of Kampala, called on the government not to allow such renegade religious groups to operate, saying they might cause confusion among Ugandans.

''I call upon government to avoid registering such new churches,'' he said. ''They can bring about religious conflicts.''

Photo: Rev. Fr. Leonard Lubega, the bishop-elect, and Fr. Matovu Seguya of the Catholic Apostolic National Church in Uganda

Related articles from New Vision:

• Rebel Catholic church opens in Uganda (12/29/2009)


• Catholic sect has received support – Bishop (12/31/2009)


• Cardinal slams breakaway Catholic sect (12/31/2009)