Celibacy and the Catholic Priest By Thomas G. Lederer, M.A.
By clicking the link at the conclusion of this blog, you will find the complete thesis upon which this blog is based. The paper about celibacy and the Catholic priesthood was part of an independent study project that I had worked on with the guidance of a priest that I had met while reporting a story about the Seminary of the Immaculate Conception in Lloyd Harbor, NY for the New York Times back in 1985.
At the time that I wrote the Times article, the priest was a scripture professor of note at the Seminary, a columnist for the Long Island Catholic weekly newspaper, and was serving weekend masses at a parish in Centerport. He had just completed his doctoral thesis about the proportionately large number of sexually conflicted men who became priests. Subsequent to the publication of his thesis, the priest was summarily removed from his teaching position at the Seminary and was reassigned to a parish.
In context with today’s perspective on priestly sexual dysfunction, that priest probably would have been viewed as a whistle-blower, who had been punished, retaliated against by a diocese with its own very serious personnel problems. He resigned the priesthood a short time after his reassignment, he got married, raised kids, and became a practicing psychologist in Suffolk County on Long Island.
Although my own thesis on celibacy is imperfect in many ways and is certainly somewhat dated–having been written decades prior to the more recent furor over the abuse of children by Catholic priests– it may nonetheless provide some insight into the pathology within the Church infrastructure and a foreshadowing of what was to come.
Some individuals may question the direct relevance of clerical abstinence to the issue of sexual abuse of children by priests. However, at the time I wrote the paper and still today, I placed a great deal of faith in statistics which suggest that the celibacy requirement dramatically limits the potential diversity of the priesthood and seems to attract an overwhelming number of immature men who are somewhat conflicted about their sexuality. While the number of priests being accused of sexual abuse is a relatively small percentage, there does seem to be a preponderance of closeted homosexuality, secrecy, cover-ups, and human resource mismanagement in far too many parishes and dioceses across the U.S. Such conditions create an atmosphere that permeates the true essence of priestly function and renders many clerics incapable of following Christ’s edicts grounded with honesty and integrity.
I am still convinced that the Catholic Church in the U.S. can heal some of its present wounds by welcoming back as deacons priests who were either excommunicated or laicized when they gave up the priesthood, perhaps to marry and/or to raise children. The concept of allowing women to become Catholic priests is, of course, another if not more direct solution; but one that was much too much to expect from the John Paul II’s papacy and his selective embrace of his Ordinatio Sacerdotalis. His stance pretty much silenced discussion on that topic ever since.
Meanwhile, the celibacy policy and devastating side-effects will continue to drive more nails into the coffin of a stolid and sinful church infrastructure that Jesus never envisioned nor would ever have condoned.
http://www.arthurstreet.com/celibacy1993.html
“There’s Something About Mary”
By Thomas G. Lederer, M.A.
In all four gospels of the New Testament, as Jesus’ fate is secured and his passion begins, a woman comes to him and anoints him with a precious ointment, an act of great significance in Old and New Testament times. Those are the only consistent specifics that we have about that event because it varies significantly in each gospel.
We do not know for certain who the woman was and what was her specific intent. We do not know for certain whether it was Christ’s feet or his head that was anointed because it happens both ways in the different gospels. And, much to the chagrin of feminists, we do not know why the act did not receive the kind of recognition or import that Jesus gave it in Mark (14:9) when he said, “And truly I say to you, whenever the gospel is preached in the whole world, what she has done will be told in memory of her.”
Matthew’s Gospel portrays the anointing in similar fashion to Mark, while Luke paints a portrait, not of a prophet but a sinful, wicked female, groveling in her search for forgiveness. It is in John’s Gospel that the woman is finally given a name, Mary of Bethany, the sister of Lazarus and Martha.
Down through the centuries, hundreds, perhaps thousands of books have been written about women in the New Testament, with special attention paid to Mary, Jesus’ mother, and Mary Magdalene, a special woman in Jesus’ life, debated to be either saint or sinner or a bit of both. Little has been directed toward Mary of Bethany who may have been most representative of the woman around Jesus in the New Testament.
It is Mary of Bethany who anoints Jesus, quietly assuming the role of a prophet in the first vivid foreshadowing of his fate. It is she who demonstrates the proper spiritual perspective in reference to the man who, for many, will become the savior of the human race, and revealed in subsequent theology as the Son of God. It is she who is thought by some to have become Jesus’ most effective evangelist.
The lack of attention paid to Mary of Bethany aggravates University of Notre Dame professor Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza in her book–seen from a feminist perspective, In Memory of Her. Dr. Fiorenza says that male chroniclers and interpreters of New Testament events cannot bring themselves to admit the important roles that women played as disciples, as proclaimers of Jesus’ miraculous resurrection, or, in the case of Mark’s unidentified woman, the highly honored role of the prophetic anointer of a King.
“In the passion account of Mark’s Gospel, three disciples figure prominently: on one hand, Judas who betrays Jesus, and Peter who denies him and on the other hand, the unnamed woman who anoints Jesus,” said Dr. Fiorenza. “While the stories of Judas and Peter are engraved in the memory of Christians, the story of this woman is virtually forgotten.”
Who Killed Evelyn Battel?
I made my way south along Broadway Greenlawn on that muggy August morning in 1984. I drove conservatively because I probably could have been cited for driving while comatose if pulled over by police. The sun had barely found its way above the horizon. No one in his or her right mind could voluntarily be up and attempting to function that early on a Saturday, or so I thought.
I had decided to work a few early hours to try to lighten the load of paper on my desk. At 5:30 AM, I was surprised to see any sign of life let alone a contingent of Suffolk County Police sector cars diverting traffic off Broadway. That much police activity and what was obviously a crime-scene investigation shocked me out of my mid-summer funk and my self-imposed somnambulism.
I read in the next day’s newspaper that the bloodied, battered, body of a young woman had been found on Broadway Greenlawn, close to the intersection of Milton Place. She was identified as Evelyn Battel, a 24-year old waitress who was living on Wall Street in Huntington Village. The fact that I am still thinking about this gruesome crime so many years later should serve as an indication as to profound effect that her death had upon me. Raising two pre-teenaged daughters at the time, I was overwhelmed by the horrific, senseless loss of life.
Years passed and little was heard about the case. A reporter made an off-the-record inquiry as to the status of the investigation. An off-the-record answer came back that, thus far, no arrests had been made and one was not imminent. The cops had a suspect but were taking their time putting together a case. Finally, three years after the crime, a local man was arrested. He was released prior to a trial because prosecutors lacked irrefutable evidence linking him with the woman. The accused persistently maintained that it was all a case of mistaken identity, and inconclusive DNA testing subsequently cleared him.
We hear a great deal about the unpleasant by-products of the bar scenes in our towns, villages, and hamlets: under-aged drinking, the altercations, the traffic accidents, the drug and alcohol overdoses. Yet, not enough emphasis is placed upon the dangers lurking in the corners of the clubs, the guys with too much booze, too much smoke, or too much blow or smack or Ecstasy or steroids in them, looking to prove yet unresolved manhood, to perhaps compensate for an underdeveloped or abused psyche, or to satiate restless hormonal surges.
And then there are the young ladies with their own growing pains, looking for companionship, looking for male approval, or maybe just looking for a dance partner. Parents caution kids so often about so much that we are more than likely “yessed” to the heights of condescension while the listening mode has actually been shut down. They often don’t hear us when we tell them that a drink or two, or a tablet or a toke or three can ease self-consciousness, can relax them into a calm, courageous state of vulnerability, which can transform that pretty young package of potential into a victim waiting to happen.
For every five young women sitting wistfully at a table sipping a drink, there is probably at least one guy coming out of the men’s room who’s not in touch with his manhood, whose brain is just toasted enough to snap at an implied rejection or the word “no.”
Is there an answer to all this? I have none. Cracking down on underage drinking, more counseling about the poison that is readily available in bottles and cans, closer monitoring of the over-crowded bars and early-morning drinking hours don’t seem to provide an easy answer.
There is a disturbing bottom line here. A woman gets off work, goes to a local pub, leaves with a man, and is found the next morning discarded in the middle of the road, beaten, raped, strangled, and dead. The killer could still very well be walking down local streets, frequenting the stores, the restaurants, the jogging paths, with your wife, your daughter, maybe mine. He’s aged since he murdered Evelyn Battel. But he’s killed before and is capable of doing it again.
I would like to be able to ask Evelyn Battel for her opinion on these matters, but unfortunately, she’s not available at this time. More than two decades have passed, we still don’t know why she never had the chance to celebrate her 25th birthday.
FrThom
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