Celibacy:

Rome's Hypocrisy!

Thomas Aquinas once said of Peter the apostle:

"Jesus did not separate Peter from his wife because he did not wish to sever the bond of matrimony which was of God's making."  

Some Catholic apologists have tried to argue that Peter, upon the Lord's calling, abandoned his wife and children to follow Jesus. However, not only does Catholicism's great Aquinas disagree with this, but if we follow the clear and very helpful hermeneutic pattern that Luther rediscovered - Scripture with Scripture to interpret the Bible - we find certain verses which would defiantly prohibit a spouse leaving his or her family to fend for themselves.

It should also be pointed out that God, under the Mosaic law, made it compulsory to love and serve ones own family (Ex. 20:12.)

To do otherwise, would be very shameful.

In 1 Cor. 7:21, the apostle Paul tells us:

"Brethren, let every man [women too] wherein he is called [salvation], therein abide with God."

A sinner, who comes to faith in Christ, was and is - according the word of God - to stay, as they are, i.e., married, single or divorced. If a Christian comes to faith in Christ and goes on to leave his family, or worse still his children, than according to the Bible, he is not only irresponsible but is worse than an infidel (1 Tim. 5:8.)  

In the third and fourth century AD, Roman Catholicism took a rather bizarre and pagan view with regards to sex in the marriage. Priests who were married, most were and with numerous concubines too, were not permitted to have intercourse with their wives at all. Multitudes, of course, ignored this teaching and to this day still do. So Rome was forced to come to the conclusion that promiscuity within the clergy is tolerable, so long as it is kept hush.

During the 1500s the Catholic Church hunted down priests that had married, and subsequently such people would be murdered. One example would be Cardinal Beaton. This Cardinal in 1540 set out to track down one, Thomas Cocklaw, a priest of many years standing. However, when he failed to achieve this, it was decided that the priest, which had married this newly wed couple, would be arrested and later executed. This was done to set an example to those who would challenged "Rome's authority" of the subject or the forbidding of priests marrying.

The hypocrisy of this whole saga is breathtaking, for Beaton had 10 CHILDREN OF HIS OWN - being seven boys and three girls (source: The Register of the Great Seal of Scotland, 1513-1546.)

In James Billton's book Calvinism is it Biblical he quotes from former Catholic priest, David Rice:

"...At the very least 100,000 priests have been excommunicated in recent years because they have done what is right and made legitimate their relationship with a woman. Priests can have children and the Church will support them financially, but whenever they officially marry all financial help stops and the priest is excommunicated, although, if a priest in the Church of England converts to Rome, he is accepted as a priest, wife and all" (pg. 20.)

One other thing that should be said is when 5,000 vicars from the Church of England came over to the Catholic Church in the early 1990s, a deal was made, so as to allow all their children to attend mainly private schools, with the dioceses picking up the costs.

The council of Trent, in 1563, made the following official and rather strange statement concerning the Holy See's view on marriage and celibacy:  

"If anyone says the married state is to be placed above the state of virginity or of celibacy and that it is not better and more blessed to remain in virginity and celibacy than to be united in matrimony, let him be anathema" [a curse!]

This statement is in direct opposition to the writer of Hebrews:

"Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge" (13:4.)

This Catholic Church, for over four hundred years, has dangled this and other curses in front of millions of Catholics and Protestants worldwide. Even after Vatican II, when freemasons, atheists, ultra-liberals, communists and six Protestant theologians totally and utterly dismantled their mass and other sacred Catholic practices, this medieval curse was NEVER omitted from the statue books.

A true child of God should have no concerns with such an anti-biblical teaching, for he is covered in his Lord's eternal righteousness (Rom. 4:5.)