Joy and Austin: Back in Arkansas?

[Carm_88]

The vast majority of Catholic priests do not live in mansions, nor do they have a lot of things. There are always a few bad apples who will rise to the surface and everyone will use it to point out "Look at them." My parish priest lives in a little house, he drives a little car, he spends most days at mass, these days I'm sure that he's doing a fair amount of pre-marriage counselling. He will never be rich and that's fine because the vast majority of his parishioners will never be rich either. It doesn't stop anyone from opening their wallets to give to the various charities that the church is involved in. Do priests need to be married? That's not for me to decide, it's not like they don't know what they are signing up for. 

[Swamptribe]

22 hours ago, subsaharanafrica said:

A practical reason I've heard a few times with regard to priests not marrying is the frequency with which they're reassigned.  IIRC the average amount of time a priest stays in one parish is 5 years.  We've been here a year and a half and are on our fourth priest--the first was sent to the US, the second to somewhere in Europe, and the 3rd to the Middle East.  When we were living on the East Coast of the US our parish preist was sent somewhere in the American Southwest.  When we were living in Prague the priest was from the Bronx and was sent to the Czech Republic after spending a decade or so in Poland.  

People with families are far less mobile than people without them, especially when it comes to multiple international moves.  Speaking from personal experience (as moving internationally every 2-5 years is something we happen to do) there aren't a lot of families who are cut out for it.  The issues just magnify once kids are in the picture.   In our world it's really not uncommon for one spouse to move on 6-8 weeks' notice and the other to stay with the kids for months until school is out.  Or for the other spouse and kids not to make the move at all.       

I have zero problems with priests marrying.  Just throwing that out there that when you're dealing with the logistics of relocating people it's a lot easier if they're unattached.

Growing up going to Catholic school, I was taught that Priests don't marry because they are basically married to their parishioners.  They parishioners are their first priority; not a wife and children. 

[Lurky]

10 minutes ago, Swamptribe said:

Growing up going to Catholic school, I was taught that Priests don't marry because they are basically married to their parishioners.  They parishioners are their first priority; not a wife and children. 

This is a good point.  I know a couple of people with Vicars/Pastors as parents, and those kids could pretty much never come first.  It's not all bad, but being a Pastor's Kid has an acronym, and a set of common experiences because it's such a specific life, and part of that is knowing your needs come second to the church duty.

But it does make me scratch my head when people from 1 denomination say something would be impossible that's common practice across the world - married vicars are super-common in the Church of England, Methodists etc etc, or that the only way to have married priests would be to stop services that other churches manage to do all over the world.  

I completely support that traditions are different, and that different churches have different rules, but even as an atheist I disagree that the leader of a local church having a family means there's no money for services for needy people, as my friends' churches managed to do both (with in every case, the wife of the Pastor/Vicar being an unpaid employee of the church providing some of those services)

[SilverBeach]

42 minutes ago, Swamptribe said:

Growing up going to Catholic school, I was taught that Priests don't marry because they are basically married to their parishioners.  They parishioners are their first priority; not a wife and children. 

Unfortunately, married clergy of any denomination are often married to their parishioners too. I think pastors of any denomination (just about all who are married with children that I have known) struggle to balance the needs of their families with the needs of the church. I know mine does. Many congregations don't want a single pastor, male or female.

Don't married priests support their own families? Those who received special dispensation to serve as Catholic priests typically don't serve full time, do they?

My church emphasizes service, but our main sanctuary is a gym during the rest of the week. We just don't care about having a fancy building. Our pastors receive a living wage, and it doesn't hamper our ability to serve locally and internationally. I think that's kind of a straw man argument.

That said, Catholic Charities is wonderful. As are all the great Catholic hospitals and schools. I have nothing but respect for these institutions which play such a vital role in the world, not just the USA.

It could be that allowing married priests would have been a reasonable part of a solution to the sexual abuse problem, which cost (and is costing) the church a pretty penny. Long-standing tradition is extremely resistant to change though. 

I prefer to focus on the commonalities among my fellow believers. There is no perfect church or denomination. 

[sawasdee]

Cradle catholic here. Our church was bombed out in WW2, and my earliest memories of Mass were in a pub still smelling of beer and cigarettes from Saturday night. We were a poor parish and 15 years after the war still had no church, and for a while shared a Methodist Chapel.

Then we got a new parish priest. Priests do not take a vow of poverty unless they belong to an order that requires it - Carmelites, I think Jesuits, and some others. Our priest was a major shareholder in a brewery - he built a new church and a new school, which had previously been in a set of terraced (row) houses. We always said it should have been called St. Tolly Cobbold, not St Joan of Arc!

We then moved, in the early sixties, to a new parish - with large 19C church, school and convent. The parish was very large, and we had always at least three priests, who lived in a presbytery between the church and the pub - one could always be found in one of the three buildings.....

[Trynn]

I've been reading lately that at least one scholar believes that the book of Luke/acts was actually written by and for a woman. That it was supposed to read "most excellent theophile" instead of "most excellent theophilus(ep).

Of course I don't know how true that is, nor can I recall the title of the book. I can look it up later when I'm more awake.

[VanillaBean]

So... would Jesus be at Camp Half Blood with Percy Jackson? I know his dad wasn't a Greek good,  but this image is killing me. 

[justoneoftwo]

4 minutes ago, VanillaBean said:

So... would Jesus be at Camp Half Blood with Percy Jackson? I know his dad wasn't a Greek good,  but this image is killing me. 

It depends on your view of the trinity.  My understanding is that he is G-d, and is G-d's kid.  So if he is G-d then he isn't a half blood, right?  

[VelociRapture]

51 minutes ago, justoneoftwo said:

It depends on your view of the trinity.  My understanding is that he is G-d, and is G-d's kid.  So if he is G-d then he isn't a half blood, right?  

But he was also borne of a human woman. So he'd have to be a Half-Blood. Unless Mary was like... God's gestational carrier?

(Also, I need to go back and reread this thread now because I forgot how we wound up combining Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, and Jesus. )

[justoneoftwo]

33 minutes ago, VelociRapture said:

But he was also borne of a human woman. So he'd have to be a Half-Blood. Unless Mary was like... God's gestational carrier?

(Also, I need to go back and reread this thread now because I forgot how we wound up combining Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, and Jesus. )

Right, I've never really gotten how he was both G-d and human, maybe someone who really understands the trinity can jump in?  Because they are separate, but also all the same (or it would become polytheism right?)

[ladybug15]

45 minutes ago, VelociRapture said:

But he was also borne of a human woman. So he'd have to be a Half-Blood. Unless Mary was like... God's gestational carrier?

(Also, I need to go back and reread this thread now because I forgot how we wound up combining Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, and Jesus. )

i think that's the idea of immaculate conception. She was a virgin getting pregnant by God's word/will. So you can say she was like a surrogate.

[Coconut Flan]

That is not what the immaculate conception means.  The immaculate conception means Mary was conceived without original sin.  It's a very common misunderstanding.

[justoneoftwo]

2 minutes ago, Coconut Flan said:

That is not what the immaculate conception means.  The immaculate conception means Mary was conceived without original sin.  It's a very common misunderstanding.

Not being snarky but honestly asking, wouldn't that mean every birth from a married couple was immaculate?  Sex while married isn't a sin... or is it saying that Mary was totally without sin ever?  Thanks for explaining! 

[Mr. Pink]

9 minutes ago, justoneoftwo said:

Not being snarky but honestly asking, wouldn't that mean every birth from a married couple was immaculate?  Sex while married isn't a sin... or is it saying that Mary was totally without sin ever?  Thanks for explaining! 

It means that Mary herself was not sinful.

ETA: The "conception" part refers to the belief that all are sinners at the time of their conception- with the excepetion of Mary. At the time of her conception, she was "immaculate" and didn't carry original sin.

[justoneoftwo]

1 minute ago, Mr. Pink said:

It means that Mary herself was not sinful.

Okay, so Mary was without sin, but I thought Jesus was the only person ever without sin?  Am I misremembering?  Isn't there original sin we are all born with?  If so how did Mary avoid that?  

Sorry for asking so many questions, just sincerely trying to remember the theology.

[Mr. Pink]

3 minutes ago, justoneoftwo said:

Okay, so Mary was without sin, but I thought Jesus was the only person ever without sin?  Am I misremembering?  Isn't there original sin we are all born with?  If so how did Mary avoid that?  

Sorry for asking so many questions, just sincerely trying to remember the theology.

That I am not sure of. I know the early church made a decree or something that she was sinless but I do not know how they reached that conclusion.

[singsingsing]

3 minutes ago, justoneoftwo said:

Okay, so Mary was without sin, but I thought Jesus was the only person ever without sin?  Am I misremembering?  Isn't there original sin we are all born with?  If so how did Mary avoid that?  

Sorry for asking so many questions, just sincerely trying to remember the theology.

Honestly, I thought that too. I thought the immaculate conception just meant that Mary did not have original sin, NOT that she was sinless her entire life, but the stuff I'm reading is suggesting that the Catholic belief is that she was actually totally sinless. I always thought Jesus was supposed to be the only human being entirely without sin, but that must just be the protestant teaching.

[2manyKidzzz]

Well, you know the old joke that Jesus was defending the woman caught in adultery when they were getting ready to stone her and says "The person without sin should cast the first stone". 

In comes a stone and Jesus says "Mommmmmm". Pronounced "Mah-ummmm". Like kids do. 

[justoneoftwo]

4 minutes ago, 2manyKidzzz said:

Well, you know the old joke that Jesus was defending the woman caught in adultery when they were getting ready to stone her and says "The person without sin should cast the first stone". 

In comes a stone and Jesus says "Mommmmmm". Pronounced "Mah-ummmm". Like kids do. 

I've never heard that joke, but its great.  

[allthegoodnamesrgone]

2 hours ago, Coconut Flan said:

That is not what the immaculate conception means.  The immaculate conception means Mary was conceived without original sin.  It's a very common misunderstanding.

I don't remember that in any of my catholic learning anywhere. I was taught that it was literally because Mary was a virgin, thus Christ wasn't conceived in Original sin (lust) Remember Mary & Joseph weren't married yet, and when she was found to be with child he was going to quietly divorce her, or quit the contract he entered with hr father, until an angle came to him and told him not to.  While Mary is revered at Christs mother it wasn't because she was sinless, only God & Christ are said to be without sin. 

[Coconut Flan]

We can't get more down to it than the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

Quote

The Immaculate Conception

490 To become the mother of the Savior, Mary "was enriched by God with gifts appropriate to such a role."132 The angel Gabriel at the moment of the annunciation salutes her as "full of grace".133 In fact, in order for Mary to be able to give the free assent of her faith to the announcement of her vocation, it was necessary that she be wholly borne by God's grace.

491 Through the centuries the Church has become ever more aware that Mary, "full of grace" through God,134 was redeemed from the moment of her conception. That is what the dogma of the Immaculate Conception confesses, as Pope Pius IX proclaimed in 1854:

The most Blessed Virgin Mary was, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of almighty God and by virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, preserved immune from all stain of original sin.135

492 The "splendor of an entirely unique holiness" by which Mary is "enriched from the first instant of her conception" comes wholly from Christ: she is "redeemed, in a more exalted fashion, by reason of the merits of her Son".136 The Father blessed Mary more than any other created person "in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places" and chose her "in Christ before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless before him in love".137

493 The Fathers of the Eastern tradition call the Mother of God "the All-Holy" (Panagia), and celebrate her as "free from any stain of sin, as though fashioned by the Holy Spirit and formed as a new creature".138 By the grace of God Mary remained free of every personal sin her whole life long.

 

[Four is Enough]

@allthegoodnamesrgone, you are wrong. Mary was the Immaculate Conception. She was conceived without sin, and became the vessel of God, bearing Jesus. Only a sinless woman could bear the Son of God. Better review your catechism.

 

ETA: and now, thanks to @Coconut Flan, you can.

[allthegoodnamesrgone]

Thanks for that this is NOT what I was taught. I believe you, I'm just telling you what I was told in CCD and at church.  This was 30 years ago aw well, so.

 

[Greendoor]

I truly believe my grandmother , born 1897, who said babies get to this world in one way only.  She was certain that the overshadowing was his divine soul, and that Joseph and Mary were a little early in their relationship.  She had no problem with that either.  

Not that we don't all have a spark of divinity; just that humans have two human parents. 

 

[mango_fandango]

(If I may wade in here...)

My mother's cousin is a Catholic priest (who's also the head of a prep school). He is married with two kids (one of whom is about my age; our families met when we were babies but I haven't seen them since). Apparently he was originally Anglican but converted to Catholicism later, and by this point he was already married with the two children. He became a priest a year after his conversion. 

Interestingly, he's also the only family member who is religious. He has a sister (also with a daughter my age) but that branch of the family is not religious (although the daughter did go to a Catholic school). Although apparently my grandfather (mother's father) was engaged to a Catholic woman before meeting and eventually marrying my grandmother.