A few weeks ago in my parish church newsletter.
Um, which is a Roman Catholic Church here in Oxford.
Uh, it was announced that the parish priest was, um, being moved, uh, at the end of the summer to another, parish.
And that, the priest who would then be in charge was our assistant priest who is also, um, an assistant chaplain in the university.
Um, and also does a lot of retreats as a retreat director.
What is interesting about this, is the fact that he is a married priest.
A married Roman Catholic priest.
He, um, had originally been, uh, an Anglican priest.
And, um, became a Catholic some years ago.
And worked as a, lay person in the church.
And also as a spiritual director for some years before he was allowed to be ordained.
Um, he’s actually a, a younger man than many of the Catholic priests that were ordained, and has a family.
And, um, so this is quite a, um, a novel experience for a parish.
Having a married priest in charge.
Because quite often they are assistant priests or, um, chaplains or, re- retreat directors.
Um, all of which this particular priest is.
But, um, from the end of the summer his other duties will be taken from him 'cause he won’t have time to do it.
As he’ll be in charge of a very big parish with several mass centres in it.
Um, and he will be in charge, along with a deacon.
And the deacon is also married.
Um, what we call a permanent married deacon.
So we will have two married men running the parish.
Which I think will be a very healthy thing, for our parish and for the church.
And this is beginning to happen more and more.
People aren’t actually always aware of this.
That we do have married priests in the Catholic church.
And, perhaps it’s a more recent thing in the western Catholic church.
But in the eastern Catholic church which is all part of the Catholic tradition.
They have always had married and celibate clergy working side by side.
Very similar to the Orthodox church.
So throughout Eastern Europe, um, all the different rites you have like Marionite and, Byzantine rite.
And, I think there are about a half a dozen different rites, for the different eastern Catholic traditions.
They have always had a married clergy.
And even in the western church, which people aren’t always aware of.
It was only in the twelfth century, that it became church law, can- what we call canon law, that priests were not allowed to marry.
Um, in practice there weren’t that many around by the twelfth century perhaps, um, for various reasons.
Because of inheritance laws and, uh, other more practical regulations like that.
Um, but in the early church, um, there had always been a married clergy.
And, um, if you go back to your gospels of course, Peter himself was married.
Hehe.
Um, so maybe one day we’ll get a married pope again.
Because, um, in the Roman Catholic tradition we always look on Peter as being the first pope.
Um, and so anyway i think this is, uh, a very exciting innovation that we’re going to have in our parish.
And it is actually something that is beginning to happen more and more, um, in this country.
And has actually for the last twenty years been happening in other countries.
Like in Australia and, um, Canada, and New Zealand.
Um, and I think that, um, a married, a married man with his wife and family can only enrich, um, their local community.
And also too the fact of, um, the priest’s wife being, engaged in perhaps some of the, responsibilities of, running the parish.
Or assisting in there will, um, perhaps pave the way for, seeing women in a different light.
And the revival of women deacons.
Which is something which has been talked about quite a bit in this country.
In fact our Cardinal, Hume has talked about this, um, fairly recently.
And so have other, leading clergy.
Because you have the tradition of women deacons there, right through the early centuries.
And who knows with_ um, once we get women deacons, um, maybe then we’ll even get women priests.
Who knows?