March 28, 2002
Cardinal enters celibacy row
From Nicholas Wapshott in Washington
Times Online
THE Roman Catholic doctrine that priests should be unmarried and celibate has been questioned by Cardinal Roger Mahony, the head of America's largest Roman Catholic community.
The Cardinal, Archbishop of Orange and Los Angeles, is the most senior American Catholic to stray from the Vatican line, which was confirmed in a recent declaration by the Pope, who said that celibacy and marriage among priests were not to be discussed by members of the Church.
The Cardinal added his voice to a growing number of senior Catholic clergymen discussing the issue in the light of the child sex scandal engulfing the Church in America. He welcomed an editorial in the newspaper Pilot Catholic suggesting that the "scandals have raised serious questions in the minds of the laity that simply will not disappear", including the Church's position on celibacy, with which, it said, most of America's 62 million Catholics disagreed.
The article, in the official organ of the Boston archdiocese, was written by Monsignor Peter Conley, a close confidant of Cardinal Bernard Law, a Conservative on theological issues. Boston was the first diocese to be affected by the child abuse scandal after the conviction in January of Father John Geoghan for molesting a child. He is accused of abuse by 130 others over 30 years.
Speaking after a Mass at Our Lady of Refuge church in Long Beach, California, Cardinal Mahony said: "I've never said that we can't discuss these things." He added that some Orthodox Catholic priests can marry, saying: "It works out fine."
But Cardinal Mahony said that there was no correlation between the Church's current mandate of celibacy and child abuse. Sexual abusers, he said, were often married men.
Cardinal Mahony told about 300 Catholic priests at the Mass that he would support victims of child sexual abuse by priests who now wanted to break confidentiality agreements, but said that he would not release the names of their abusers. The Cardinal said that in his 40 years as a priest he had never felt so devastated as he had by the child abuse scandal. A new standard of openness and frankness had been established on abuse by clergy, he said, and since July his diocese had adopted a policy of zero tolerance.
Archbishop Rembert Weakland of Milwaukee, one of America's most liberal bishops, wrote last week: "Perhaps (the scandal) will be the moment when the larger issue of priestly ministry in the Church will be faced." He said he had become more open to the notion of married clergy since visiting Eastern Orthodox churches abroad. He added that the doctrine that vetoes marriage was diluted when the Pope allowed married Episcopal priests to convert to Catholicism, and that the example could encourage the Church to move ahead in unexpected ways.
Cardinal enters celibacy row
From Nicholas Wapshott in Washington
Times Online
THE Roman Catholic doctrine that priests should be unmarried and celibate has been questioned by Cardinal Roger Mahony, the head of America's largest Roman Catholic community.
The Cardinal, Archbishop of Orange and Los Angeles, is the most senior American Catholic to stray from the Vatican line, which was confirmed in a recent declaration by the Pope, who said that celibacy and marriage among priests were not to be discussed by members of the Church.
The Cardinal added his voice to a growing number of senior Catholic clergymen discussing the issue in the light of the child sex scandal engulfing the Church in America. He welcomed an editorial in the newspaper Pilot Catholic suggesting that the "scandals have raised serious questions in the minds of the laity that simply will not disappear", including the Church's position on celibacy, with which, it said, most of America's 62 million Catholics disagreed.
The article, in the official organ of the Boston archdiocese, was written by Monsignor Peter Conley, a close confidant of Cardinal Bernard Law, a Conservative on theological issues. Boston was the first diocese to be affected by the child abuse scandal after the conviction in January of Father John Geoghan for molesting a child. He is accused of abuse by 130 others over 30 years.
Speaking after a Mass at Our Lady of Refuge church in Long Beach, California, Cardinal Mahony said: "I've never said that we can't discuss these things." He added that some Orthodox Catholic priests can marry, saying: "It works out fine."
But Cardinal Mahony said that there was no correlation between the Church's current mandate of celibacy and child abuse. Sexual abusers, he said, were often married men.
Cardinal Mahony told about 300 Catholic priests at the Mass that he would support victims of child sexual abuse by priests who now wanted to break confidentiality agreements, but said that he would not release the names of their abusers. The Cardinal said that in his 40 years as a priest he had never felt so devastated as he had by the child abuse scandal. A new standard of openness and frankness had been established on abuse by clergy, he said, and since July his diocese had adopted a policy of zero tolerance.
Archbishop Rembert Weakland of Milwaukee, one of America's most liberal bishops, wrote last week: "Perhaps (the scandal) will be the moment when the larger issue of priestly ministry in the Church will be faced." He said he had become more open to the notion of married clergy since visiting Eastern Orthodox churches abroad. He added that the doctrine that vetoes marriage was diluted when the Pope allowed married Episcopal priests to convert to Catholicism, and that the example could encourage the Church to move ahead in unexpected ways.