Church urged to can celibacy

Father Humphrey O'Leary says married priests might have more empathy. Picture / Kenny Rodger

A retired Auckland Catholic priest is courting controversy by publicly urging the church to accept married men into the clergy.

Father Humphrey O'Leary, a former canon law lawyer and academic who now cares for elderly brothers and priests in Glendowie, wants to see the issues of marriage and celibacy debated at the highest levels of the church as it faces an "extreme shortage" of clergy.

He told the Weekend Herald he had already faced a backlash from views he expressed in the independent Catholic magazine Tui Motu.

"But I have had support from other priests ... I'm not just a lone voice," Father O'Leary said.

"We have lost a lot of good men who, after some years of excellent ministry, decide it isn't for them to continue to be single."

Catholic Communications director Lyndsay Freer said Father O'Leary had made some "very significant observations" about the need to recruit enough priests to ensure Mass and the Eucharist continued to be accessible to all.

"The church's consistent teaching for a thousand years that celibacy is a requirement for clergy in the Western church has not stopped discussion and debate on the subject, although there seems little possibility that things will change in the foreseeable future," Mrs Freer said.

Father O'Leary told the Weekend Herald he had intended the magazine article to be controversial, but insisted he had no selfish agenda.

"I'm not a candidate for marriage myself. I'm an 80-year-old."

In his comment piece in Tui Motu, Father O'Leary said the Synod of Bishops in Rome in October was a prime opportunity for the debate.

"Maybe the ordination of married men, much less of women, will be kept from the agenda. In which case, it is to be hoped that the Holy Spirit will inspire some courageous bishop to take action," he said.

Almost all of the Eastern Catholic churches had married parish clergy, said Father O'Leary. A case could be made for replicating this in the West.

"For instance, they might say that a married pastor could more readily appreciate the spousal and parental issues faced by parishioners than could a celibate, whose acquaintance with such matters must of necessity be second-hand."

Dr Philip Culbertson, of the School of Theology at the University of Auckland, said the issue was being hotly debated by Catholics overseas, such as in the United States, which was suffering a "crisis shortage" of priests.

Removing restrictions on marriage and sex could "alleviate the dilemma".

"It would open up the possibility some more people would step forward - but it won't solve the problem."

Dr Culbertson said that until about 1000 years ago, priests were not required to be celibate.