Let priests marry, says Pope Francis adviser

CATHOLIC priests should be allowed to marry in a dramatic reform that would overturn centuries of Church tradition, an adviser to Pope Francis says.

Priests all around the world strike up clandestine sexual relationships with women and have secret children because of the official ban on marriage, according to Archbishop Charles Scicluna from Malta.

He said there was nothing in the Scriptures forbidding priests from marrying and said the ban had only been in place for the past few hundred years.

“It was optional for the first millennium of the Church’s existence and it should become optional again,” said Archbishop Scicluna, who holds one of the most influential positions within the Holy See as adjunct secretary of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith.

“If it were up to me, I would revise the requirement that priests have to be celibate. Experience has shown me that this is something we need to seriously think about.

“A man may mature, engage in relationships, love a woman. As it stands, he must choose between her and priesthood and some priests cope with that by secretly engaging in sentimental relationships. This is a global reality; it doesn’t just happen in Malta. We know there are priests around the world who also have children and I think there are ones in Malta who may have too,” he told the Times of Malta.

The time had come to “discuss the issue seriously” and take practical steps, the archbishop said, acknowledging that his forthright views might be seen by some Catholics as heresy.

“This is probably the first time I’m saying it publicly and it will sound heretical to some people. Why should we lose a young man who would have made a fine priest, just because he wanted to get married? And we did lose good priests just because they chose marriage.” Archbishop Scicluna, 64, who is a respected figure in the Catholic hierarchy and has had a leading role in prosecuting clergy sex abuse cases, said he had raised the issue in the Vatican but admitted that the final decision rests with Pope Francis, 87.

Earlier on in his papacy, Francis seemed cautiously open to the idea.

Some bishops argued at a synod in 2019 that there was a dearth of priests in many parts of the world, particularly in remote areas such as the Amazon. Allowing married men to become priests could address the recruitment problems, they suggested.

However, a few months after the synod, Francis ruled against allowing married men to be ordained. He stuck with the traditional Catholic line that the life of a priest should be devoted exclusively to God and his congregation, without the distraction of a family.

It was only in the 12th century that the Church required priests to be celibate – before that they had been allowed to marry and have children.