Eastern Oklahoma Catholic April 2009 : Page 2
f r o m t h e b i s h o p celibate heart I secret part the of the f you were to ask a typical Catholic leaving mass on Sunday morning what celibacy was, he or she would likely answer either that celibacy “means a priest or religious stays unmarried for the sake of the Church” or that celibacy “is like being married to the Church.” “Not getting married” is certainly one part of celibacy, but we would want to augment this prescriptive definition of what celibacy forbids (i.e., marriage) with a more positive understanding that celibacy is a way of loving that allows a person to main- tain his or her primary commitment to God, which then translates into genuine prayer and a deeply apostolic life marked by charity. But having said all this, we would Eastern Oklahoma Catholic 2 April 2009 | www.dioceseoftulsa.org still need to go one step further to understand what an extraordinary gift celibacy is to the Church. We must begin to see celibacy as a signpost illuminating the road ahead. the priest, monk or religious who freely chooses the Gospel charism of celibacy does so in order that his or her life might continually reveal the Kingdom yet to come. there, the values and virtues of this life are completed and perfected in such a way that everything makes manifest the mercy of God. Liturgical Calendar: St. Francis of Paola, hermit April 2 | St. Isidore, bishop Christ in the Desert, Ivan Kramskoi, 1872
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