Celibacy is a special vocation to live life without sexual intercourse and to integrate one’s sexuality completely into one’s life — into all that one does and says.
All of us are called to live an integrated life, expressing our masculinity or femininity in who we are as human persons, but so often we make the error of thinking that only priests and bishops, monks and nuns are called to celibacy. It is thought of as a “religious vocation.”
We make another error, I think, when we fail to see that all of us are called to integrate our sexuality into all we do as men or women, as masculine or feminine, when we compartmentalize our sexuality from our daily lives.
Not only are priests, bishops and religious called to celibacy but so too are single men and women. Their’s is a special vocation.
All our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters are called by God to celibacy and a healthy integration of their sexuality into their lives and relationships. God gives them a special vocation, and special graces. Do we treat them as people in that way? Do we recognize their struggle to express their masculinity or femininity in a healthy celibate way, a special struggle, a difficult one, and for so many a silent one?
As anyone knows who tries to live a chaste life — celibate or married — it is not easy. Our sexuality touches our core. To integrate it completely into who we are is a journey of faith and a journey into our minds, hearts and bodies.
Let us pray for all our brothers and sisters called to the celibate state of life. Let us pray for all of us married folk who together with them are called to holiness of life which includes a healthy regard for our sexuality and its integration into our whole lives.
The Church loves celibacy and will go to all costs to preserve it. Even to the point of seriously damaging the missin of the Church. You talk to most young men who sense a call from God to priesthood and many cannot nor will not overcome the demand of celibacy. Their potential vocations are not realized and the Church suffers from their loss. There needs to be alteratives.
Years ago, I worked with a youth minister who often wore a pin which stated “Peter had a mother-in-law”. We need to go back to the beginning so all can be followers and leaders within the Church of Christ.
It will be interesting to see if the Latin Rite Church eventually will call married men to the priesthood.
For all my readers information, the Eastern Rite Churches have done so for centuries, and deeply value that option. The are no married men called to the episcopacy in the Catholic Church, whether Eastern or Latin Rites.
As we hear more and more of in recent years, married protestant ministers who convert to Catholicism and wish to pursue priestly ministry can be admitted to Holy Orders under certain circumstances. My sister-in-law’s home parish in the Twin Cities has a married associate pastor who had been a Lutheran minister.
My point in the post was celibacy is a vocation to which so many are called, not just those to the priesthood or religious life. The theology of celibacy could be greatly enriched if we looked at it that way and presented it to the People of God with that appreciation. It is assumed that if one isn’t going to be a priest, then one will get married or be in some sexual relationship. My work with people has taught me that many who marry are probably not called to that vocation, and those in sexual relationships outside of marriage are unhappy and empty.