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Comment by walrus01 | Hacker News Reader

Serious question, but isn't anything that is a "married priest" not actual catholicism, as it would be recognized and approved by church HQ in Rome?

I'm confused because it does seem somehow officially okay.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_Ordinariate_of_the_Ch...

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Clerical Celibacy is a disciple rather than a dogma. It is especially prominent in the Latin rite. There are other rites in the Roman Catholic Church and some of them have married priests. When priests convert to Catholicism they are usually allowed to remain priests if they wish. They often have to be actually ordained. If they were married and ordained both stick. Neither is reversible. If they are married and "ordained" they can still be ordained.

It's a totally reasonable thing to be confused about. I was baptized at a Catholic parish as a child and I only relatively recently learned of the existence of many other rites besides the Latin one. Here[1] is an article by a canonist going into some detail. The short version is there are many churches in full communion with Rome that retain their own traditions, including married priests. Theoretically even a Latin rite priest could have the discipline of celibacy dispensed, but I've never even heard of that actually happening[2]. I wouldn't be gobsmacked if it has though.

[1] https://canonlawmadeeasy.wordpress.com/2007/09/20/are-they-r...

[2] Edit: I think it is sometimes done for laicized ("defrocked") priests, but such persons wouldn't be permitted any active priestly ministry, except for a few rare exceptions like someone in immediate danger of death asking the laicized priest to hear his confession.

Married priest are rare in the Roman Catholic Church but that is only one of the 27 Catholic Churches. There are various Eastern Catholic Churches under the Pope with their own particular laws (and many have married priests).

> Serious question, but isn’t anything that is a “married priest” not actual catholicism, as it would be recognized and approved by church HQ in Rome?

Married priests (that is, people who are priests and simultaneously are married) are and always have been fine with Rome. But, since about the 14th Century, (as a measure to address a number of scandals that were occurring that had the common theme of married priests favoring, or being seen to favor, their family over their clerical duties) it has normally been impossible for new married priests to come to exist in the Latin Rite of the Catholic Church, since priests have never been allowed to get* married in the Catholic Church, and, as a matter of discipline (not a doctrinal rule) married men have since then not been regularly ordained priests in the Latin Rite (though they continue to be in the Eastern Rite particular churches that are in union with Rome, of which there are more now than there were when the Latin Rite adopted the celibacy discipline.)

But, because this is a discipline and not a doctrinal rule about the validity of the sacrament, exceptions can be and have been granted; one of the more common ones is that married who have been ordained as priests in the Espicopal Church convert to Catholicism, they are generally permitted to be ordained as priests (after the usual preparation) in the Latin Rite despite being married.

* The rule was first stated by a Pope then, but not adopted in the form of canon law until quite a while later (apparently, the 1917 Code of Canon Law), but was accepted as the practical norm prior to that formal adoption, so its hard to date precisely.

The Roman Catholic church has constituent churches in which married priesthood is the typical path. The Latin Catholic church, which, with over a billion members, is the largest constituent of the Roman Catholic church, only ordains single men to the priesthood. In all apostolic churches (I believe), an ordained priest cannot marry after ordination without some kind of special dispensation. Also, both Catholic and Orthodox only ordain celibate men to the episcopacy.

However, there is no rule that this is the case. Any man can be ordained a priest or bishop, married or not.

Only since 24 June 1967[1] (there may be ~75+yo married Roman Catholic priests still walking around), and there are exceptions.[2]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sacerdotalis_caelibatus

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clerical_celibacy_in_the_Catho...

My neighbor across the street is a Catholic priest and the pastor at a local Catholic parish. He was married and ordained as a priest in the Episcopal church, then he and his wife had several children. His whole family later converted to the Catholic Faith; he was given the options of being ordained as a priest in the Catholic Church or finding a new path in life as a layman, and chose the former. He and his wife had several more children since then: lovely family, very much "actual Catholicism".

Not answering your question but Patricia Lockwood (one of my favorite authors) wrote a very amusing memoir called Priestdaddy about growing up with a father who was a Catholic priest (having converted from Anglicanism I believe). The book also doesn't really answer your question, but it's fantastic despite the awful name.

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