Let married men become priests, suggests Pope
THE Catholic Church should consider allowing married men to become priests, Pope Francis has said, in what would be a radical departure from Vatican teaching.
The lifting of the ban on married men being ordained would apply only in specific circumstances, for instance in remote areas of the world where priests are in short supply, the Pope said. But it would effectively reverse the centuries-old principle that Roman Catholic priests must be celibate.
In an interview with the German Die Zeit newspaper, the pontiff said he was open to the idea of so-called viri probati – married men of deep faith who are already involved in the Church – being allowed to become priests.
“We must consider if viri probati is a possibility. Then we must determine what tasks they can perform, for example, in remote communities,” he said.
Francis’s greater flexibility towards some of the Church’s thorniest contemporary problems has been a pillar of his four-year papacy.
The compassion he has brought to bear on issues such as whether Catholics who divorce and then remarry should be allowed to take Communion has earned him rock star status among liberals but earned the opprobrium of many conservatives, especially in the United States.
As the Church’s first Latin American Pope, Francis is acutely aware that large countries such Brazil suffer from a lack of priests. In the Amazon region there is just one priest for every 10,000 Catholics. Loosening the rules on who can be ordained could help. There are already a limited number of married Catholic priests, including Anglican ministers who defected to Rome, some Coptic Catholics and members of some Eastern rite Catholic churches.
Pope Francis has said in the past that while he remains in favour of celibacy for priests, the principle is part of Church discipline rather than dogma, meaning it can be discussed.
In the interview, the Pope also said he sometimes suffers from a crisis of faith over God’s existence. “I, too, know moments of emptiness,” he said, adding that he had experienced “spiritual dark moments” when he did not understand God’s intentions.
To recover his faith, he appeals to God. “I ask, and He responds. Sooner or later, eh? But at times, you have to wait, in a crisis.”
Referring to long-standing reports that his reforming zeal is meeting trenchant opposition within the Vatican, he said: “From the moment I was elected Pope I have never lost my peace. I understand that someone might not like [my] way of acting, and I even justify it: there are so many ways of thinking; it is licit, it is human, and it is even a richness.”
He jokingly complimented the “cultured” language used in highly critical posters that recently appeared on billboards around Rome, which portrayed a photograph of him looking stern and the words: “Where’s your mercy?”
The posters were written in Roman street dialect rather than standard Italian and accused the Pope of attacking conservatives within the Church.
He also said that he hopes to travel this year to countries including Portugal, India, Bangladesh and Colombia.
‘Someone might not like [my] way of acting, and I even justify it: there are so many ways of thinking’