THE HISTORY AND CONSEQUENCES OF MANDATORY CELIBACY

Part Two - 11th to the early 21st Century

The new millennium brought the Great Schism in 1054 which divided Christianity into the Orthodox Church in the East and the Roman Catholic Church in the West. The Eastern Orthodox continued the Christian tradition of allowing priests to marry before ordination, while requiring monastic priests and nuns to vow chastity. Bishops were required to be celibate and were chosen from the ranks of the monks.

The problem of homosexuality mainly in religious orders, and promiscuity among unmarried diocesan priests, was addressed by St. Peter Damien (1007-1072), a Benedictine monk and Cardinal, in The Book of Gomorrah. In his treatise, Damien asked Pope Leo IX to take steps to halt the spread of homosexual practices, mainly among monastic clergy, who were violating their vows of chastity. Because diocesan priests were allowed to marry, closeted homosexuals would generally enter religious orders where they could lead their relatives and friends to believe they were forgoing having a wife and children because of the order’s requirement that they take the vow of chastity. Historically, while the percentage of homosexuals in religious orders like the Augustinians (founded in 1256) and the Jesuits (established in 1534) is thought to be well over 80% today, it is reported that Buddhist monasteries (e.g., in Thailand) are also heavily populated with homosexuals. Straight religious priests have written about how homosexuals in their communities have suffered high death rates due to AIDS.

While no single pope “introduced” priestly celibacy as it evolved under Pope Gregory VII (1073-1085) and Pope Calixtus II (1119-1124), it was Pope Innocent II (1130-1143), a Cluniac Monk, who convened the Second Lateran Council in 1139 and who not only required celibacy for diocesan priests, but also invalidated the marriages of priests who were already married at that time. The Council document reads: “We also decree that those in the orders of subdeacon and above who have taken wives or concubines are to be deprived of their position and ecclesiastical benefice.”

Historians have debated why a Cluniac monk who never lived alone like a diocesan priest would require diocesan clergy to live like priests in religious orders who enjoy the support and companionship of other priests and brothers. Jesus, who himself did not live alone, but in the company of his disciples like a priest in a religious order, recognized the potential problems of a solitary lifestyle and was wise to send forth his apostles “two by two” (Mk 6:7, LK 10:1).

Some have argued that the motive behind requiring celibacy on the part of diocesan priests had nothing to do with ”sex, purity and holiness,” but was all about “the money.” By forbidding diocesan priests from marrying who did not take the vow of poverty, there would be no wives or children to inherit any wealth accumulated by the priest.

The popes who were instrumental in prohibiting diocesan priests from marrying were from religious communities that were shown to be plagued with homosexuals. Might Pope Innocent II have been a closeted, heterophobic homosexual who implemented mandatory celibacy for diocesan priests whose marriages he invalidated because he was jealous of married priests who could manifest their love for their wives and children publicly? Unlike married clergy, and owing to the Church’s teaching on homosexuality, closeted gay bishops and priests, then, as well as today, are forced to restrict their affection for other homosexual bishops, priests, and seminarians to behind closed doors.

According to Dr. Jules Gomes, a Cambridge-educated biblical scholar, there are Latin texts from the late 11th, early 12th centuries, warning that the imposition of celibacy on diocesan clergy would result in the ordination of more homosexual diocesan priests. This warning was validated between 1929 and 2014 when the Vatican’s imposition of mandatory celibacy on Eastern Rite priests in the diaspora resulted in the ordination of many homosexuals whose sexual abuse rates in the United States mirrored the abuse rates of homosexual Roman Catholic clergy. Eastern Rite Churches with priests living in countries outside of their native lands that did not enforce the unjust prohibition of clerical marriage (e.g., Canada), did not attract homosexuals, and reported almost no sexual abuse. What happened in Eastern Rite Churches during that almost one hundred-year period clearly demonstrates connections between celibacy, homosexuality, and ephebophilia.

Despite the promulgation of mandatory celibacy for Roman Catholic diocesan priests in the 12th century, the requirement was often ignored and rarely enforced. How could bishops enforce celibacy when so many homosexual and heterosexual popes themselves did not lead celibate lives? Pope Paul II (1464-1471) died while being sodomized by a page; Pope Sixtus IV (1471-1484) was known to be a “lover of boys and sodomites;” Pope Alexander VI (1492-1503) had illegitimate children with two women; Pope Julius II (1503-1513) had three illegitimate daughters; Pope Leo X (1513-1521), who excommunicated Martin Luther, suffered from an anal fistula as the result of too much anal sex; Pope Paul III (1534-49) fathered four illegitimate children; Pope Julius III (1540-1555) shared his bed with 15-year-old Innocenzo Ciocchi Del Monte whom he made a cardinal at the age of 17; and Pope Gregory XIII (1572-1585) had a son while he was studying for the priesthood.

Not all Catholic priests are prohibited from being married. Some Eastern Rite Churches, which had been part of the Orthodox Church following the Great Schism, reunited with the Roman Catholic Church in the 16th century on the condition that they could retain their liturgical, theological, spiritual, and disciplinary heritage, including a married clergy.

Pope John Paul II in 1980, and Pope Benedict XVI in 2009, also created provisions allowing Protestant married clergy who converted to be ordained. Special structures, such as the Ordinariate of the Chair of St. Peter in the U.S., were established to accommodate former Anglican/Episcopalian clergy.

One writer erroneously wrote,

“A priest who is ordained in the Anglican religion who converts to Roman Catholicism is admitted to the Roman Catholic priesthood, but when this is the case, it is my understanding that these men should abstain from sexual relations with their wives going forward….I believe that the rationale for this is that the man is married to Christ in his priesthood, and his wife becomes a sister to him. Obviously, both spouses would have to agree to this, which is probably one reason for its rarity.”

I can only imagine what a married priest convert, and his wife, might have to say after reading this comment that appears to reflect a very negative view of God’s gift of sexuality. Might the writer have been influenced in his thinking by St. Augustine (354–430 AD) who, having fathered a child out of wedlock with a woman with whom he had a scandalous 10-year relationship, viewed celibacy as superior to marriage? Unfortunately, Augustine’s attitude toward women as temptresses established a lasting, misogynistic influence on Christian theology, framing women as secondary and under the authority of men for centuries. Augustine even went so far as to recommend sexual abstinence for married couples—if they mutually agreed to it.

Augustine’s negative view of sexuality and women is also reflected in this recent comment from Ann Barnhardt who wrote that it was “a sick idea that men who are espoused to Jesus Christ and His Holy Church and offer the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass - a nuptial sacrifice, could possibly be sexually active with a wife.” It appears that Ann believes that the children of married Eastern Rite priests should never have been conceived, and that married priests should be living in “perfect continence.”

Many Catholics want to believe that most bishops and priests are straight and celibate. These Catholics who argue that most priests led celibate lives dating back to the time of Christ; that celibacy was implemented because Jesus was not married; or that Pope Innocent II mandated celibacy to make priests more available to serve God’s People, don’t have a grasp of Church History. Anyone with experience in working with married Eastern Rite priests knows that while married life can be demanding, marriage and family life experience can often make priests more effective and understanding than some celibate priests, including many closeted homosexual Roman Catholic clergy who are reported today to make up roughly 80 percent of the presbyterate in the U.S., Vatican City State, Spain, and other countries.

Most diocesan priests today, unlike the pope, bishops, and religious priests, live “home alone” in the priesthood. This living arrangement helps to explain why, in their loneliness, roughly half of all priests at any moment in time are not leading celibate lives, especially homosexuals who have extremely high partnering rates (a median of 67 for gay men and 10 for straight men). It also explains why only around 2 percent of priests and bishops can say that they never broke their promise of celibacy or vow of chastity after they were ordained. As more diocesan priests live alone today, finding themselves pastoring large, or often multiple parishes, one should not be surprised if this leads many of them to escape through sex, pornography, alcohol, or other unhealthy addictive behaviors.

Some Catholics will object to optional celibacy based on the additional expense of supporting a priest’s family. These same Catholics, silent when the Church went from ordaining straight candidates to ordaining mainly homosexual seminarians who have no desire for a wife and children, don’t want to talk about how the Church may end up paying $25 billion if every one of the 198 U.S. dioceses and eparchies paid out as much as Los Angeles and San Diego paid for their abuse settlements at a combined cost of $2.3 billion. Studies by researchers like Rev. Dr. Paul Sullins have shown “a high correlation between the proportion of homosexuals in the Catholic priesthood and the incidence of sexual abuse by the clergy.” This development has led 44 dioceses and religious orders to file for bankruptcy, with the Diocese of El Paso being the most recent case.

When five out of six Roman Catholic parishes closed in the West End section of Johnstown, Pennsylvania, in 2009, the one remaining Byzantine Catholic Church was in danger of closing. Before that happened, however, the Vatican in 2014 revoked its 1929 decree, Cum data fuerit, prohibiting married Easter Rite priests from ministering outside of their native lands. With the realization that he could be a married priest without being forced to promise celibacy, Timothy Fariss entered the Byzantine Catholic Seminary of Saints Cyril and Methodius in 2016; he married his wife in 2023; he was ordained a priest for the Archeparchy of Pittsburgh in April 2024; and he was appointed pastor of St. Mary Byzantine Catholic Church in Johnstown on August 1, 2024. With less than 40 aging diocesan priests remaining in the eight-county Altoona-Johnstown Diocese, it may only be a matter of time before the one remaining Roman Catholic Church in the West End of Johnstown is closed.

Unfortunately, the Roman Catholic Church is controlled today by the heterophobic Lavender Mafia whose capos don’t want to allow straight men like Timothy Fariss to marry women when homosexuals like themselves cannot “marry” other gay men. Often misogynistic and not wanting to have to deal with wives of married priests whose “gaydar” may pose a threat to their closeted existence, these prelates would also be inclined to oppose the ordination of viri probati, i.e., mature, married men of strong faith without children or whose children are grown up, who can help to address the growing priest shortage in many parts of the world. While homosexual bishops, priests, and seminarians are often known to cohabitate together (and in some cases are even buried together), decreasing numbers of straight diocesan priests are forced to eat, sleep, and live alone.

• If the Council of Nicea forbade priests from living with women with whom they were not married, fearing that they might be tempted to engage in sexual behavior, why should popes, bishops, priests, and seminarians who struggle with same-sex attraction (SSA) today be tempted and be allowed to live in the papal palace, episcopal residences, rectories, and seminaries with other homosexuals?

• Would Jesus, who acknowledged how difficult it is to live a celibate life, and who never required celibacy of his apostles, support both a celibate and a married priesthood like in the Eastern Catholic Churches, knowing that mandatory celibacy, often not practiced, is the primary deterrent for heterosexuals becoming Roman Catholic diocesan priests?

• Is it fair that heterosexuals are not only asked to refrain from sex, but to sacrifice the intimacy of married life that involves sharing love with a wife and children, while celibacy for closeted homosexuals just involves refraining from illicit, unnatural, and immoral sex?

• What are the real reasons closeted homosexual Church leaders have for limiting the pool of straight candidates for the priesthood by requiring mandatory celibacy when they know that most priests and bishops today are neither celibate nor straight?

These are just a few questions both Catholic clergy and laity really need to answer.

If you appreciate my research and writings, please contribute to the “Save Our Seminarians” Fund that will help safeguard young men from becoming victims of homosexual predation in U.S. Catholic seminaries.

Gene Thomas Gomulka is a sexual abuse victims’ advocate, investigative reporter, author, and screenwriter. A former Navy (O6) Captain/Chaplain, seminary instructor, and diocesan Respect Life Director, Gomulka was ordained a priest for the Altoona-Johnstown diocese and later made a Prelate of Honor (Monsignor) by St. John Paul II. Email him at msgr.investigations@gmail.com.