Celibacy in the priesthood is once again up for discussion. The diminished number of candidates for ordination and the abuse crisis have prodded the discussion, which seems mainly focused on the elimination of celibacy as a mandatory discipline for priests in the Western church. But a more foundational concern, in my estimation, needs our reflection before we consider any change. That concern has to do with formation for celibacy and formation in celibacy.

To resolve or even address the problem of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church, many people insist that the church must do away with mandatory celibacy for priests. If you give priests a healthy outlet for their sex drive, the thinking goes, they will not abuse minors. It sounds simple. And it echoes an ancient take on the purpose of marriage as remedium concupiscentiae, a remedy for concupiscence. Here it doubles as a remedy for abuse as well.

The elimination of priestly celibacy, however, would not eliminate abuse. Noncelibate and in many cases married men are overwhelmingly the perpetrators of sexual abuse against minors.

First, let me state the obvious. Sex—in its various dimensions: physical, emotional and even spiritual—is a powerful force. It is a gift of God, and it also carries the burdens of our wounded human condition. Everyone, no matter their gender, orientation or marital status, needs to integrate their sexuality. Ultimately, in the Christian vision, this transformative process leads to self-acceptance and self-gift. The transformation and integration of sexuality represents a universal human task. It does, however, take on a specific shape in the instance of priests who commit themselves to celibate living.

The elimination of priestly celibacy would not eliminate abuse. Noncelibate and in many cases married men are overwhelmingly the perpetrators of sexual abuse against minors.

The situation of priests

For celibate priests, there are three specific and essential elements of formation for sustaining their commitment: They need a meaningful reason for celibacy, they need skills for celibate living, and they need a supportive community.

Given the challenges and obstacles for priests to live the celibate life well, it might seem better to change the current discipline of the Western church and make celibacy optional. But much more reflection is needed to understand the positive value of the current discipline. The church’s persistence in maintaining this practice, in the face of great difficulties and even its nonobservance in certain historical contexts, suggests something that deserves careful spiritual discernment to detect the promptings of the Holy Spirit. A consideration of the three indispensable elements that make celibacy possible and real—a reason, skills and a supportive community—can actually contribute to a fuller reflection and discernment.

Celibacy is not an ordinary choice. Making the choice for celibacy requires a very deliberate decision based on a clear and even compelling reason. That reason, motivation or rationale may take on different shapes, as we will see, but it must be in place for the decision to be made and to be sustained over a lifetime. At the same time, although a motivating and meaningful reason for celibacy is essential, by itself it is insufficient.

Knowing how to live out this commitment is also necessary. In other words, celibates also need to be in possession of those life skills that enable them to stay faithful, productive and joyful in their way of life. To summarize: Celibates need a reason, skills for living and a supportive community. A quick historical survey can help us understand these elements more deeply and identify today’s challenges more precisely.

Celibates need to be in possession of those life skills that enable them to stay faithful, productive and joyful in their way of life.

Historical context for priestly celibacy

The history of celibacy for the sake of the kingdom of God begins in the New Testament. Celibacy and consecrated virginity stretch across the whole trajectory of Christian history. The more specific history of celibacy attached to holy orders has had many complex turns for both the Eastern and Western churches. For our purposes, I will limit myself to the Western church and the last 500 years, from the time of the Council of Trent (1565) to our moment today.

One of the great reforms that followed the Council of Trent was the establishment of seminaries and, with that, the possibility of consistent training and preparation for priesthood, including training or formation for celibacy. For some 500 years, until the turning point of the early 1960’s, the practice of celibacy depended on a reason (a higher call), a set of skills (vigilance and self-control—in effect, psychological suppression) and a community (expecting and demanding fidelity). Although these dynamics did not work perfectly and there certainly were breaches, they did maintain a basic consistency in the observance of the discipline of celibacy for clergy.

A dramatic shift took place in the 1960’s with the Second Vatican Council, the sexual revolution, the pill and the rise of gay rights. Whatever had been tightly wound around celibacy to hold it together seemed to unravel. There was great disruption in the church and in the culture. Anyone who lived through those tumultuous years can attest to that. Suddenly, there seemed to be no good reason for priests to be celibate, certainly not because it made them better than married lay people. In other words, gone were the reason, the skills and the supportive community.

In the years following the Second Vatican Council, the church (through the popes and others), began to offer a response to “the problem of celibacy.” In 1967 Pope Paul VI issued the encyclical “Sacerdotalis Caelibatus,” which defended celibacy for priests. The Synod of Bishops of 1971 took up the same cause and reaffirmed the discipline of celibacy for the Western church. The Congregation for Catholic Education addressed the needed skills for living out celibacy in A Guide to Formation in Priestly Celibacy (1974).

Seminaries struggled to find their way. The ongoing formation of priests, often a marginal concern and effort in church life in any case, certainly did not serve the celibate cause well in this moment. Consequences followed in the ’70s and ’80s. Far fewer candidates came forward to begin studies for the priesthood. Large numbers of those already ordained abandoned ministry. Acting out sexually and in other unhealthy ways seemed to be on the rise. And, of course, this time period also saw the largest number of cases of clerical sexual misconduct with minors.

Under the leadership of St. John Paul II, the church tried to open a new chapter in its efforts to address the challenges of priestly formation, including formation for celibacy. In 1990 Pope John Paul II summoned the Synod of Bishops to take up the questions surrounding priestly formation. With that meeting as a foundation, he issued a very significant post-synodal apostolic exhortation entitled “Pastores Dabo Vobis” (1992). This exhortation offered a large and challenging vision of priestly formation based on four pillars: human, spiritual, intellectual and pastoral.

Inadequate formation for celibacy has led to tragic situations, shattered lives and crises of faith.

“Pastores Dabo Vobis” underscores the foundational necessity of human formation, so that priests can be men of communion and integrally connected with the community of faith that they serve. The exhortation, with some further development and elaboration, could serve to re-anchor celibacy’s reason, skills and community connection. Finally, the exhortation links formation for priesthood (seminary) with formation in priesthood (ongoing formation). This linkage has important implications for celibacy. It is not enough to be prepared for the celibate commitment; it is also essential to continuously engage in celibate formation across the span of a lifetime, that is, in the different seasons of one’s life.

These last decades have marked some progress in celibate formation. Certainly, more attention is paid to this formation, for example, in the 2016 document from the Congregation for Clergy: The Gift of the Priestly Vocation: Ratio Fundamentalis Institutionis Sacerdotalis (“The Basic Plan for Priestly Formation”). Other examples might also include the various programs of priestly formation developed by national conferences of bishops to address specific national and cultural circumstances.

Still, even with all this, I do not think we have arrived at a coherent and consistent formation for celibacy or formation in celibacy. These recent decades have also produced some puzzling approaches to priesthood and celibacy that try to fuse the old and the new but fall short of fostering real integration. These models can be found in some seminaries today, in ancillary formation programs and in recruitment materials.

They tend to be neoromantic, highlighting, for example, the dramatic figure of the “heroic priest,” which does not match the day-to-day reality of priestly ministry and life. In the same neoromantic line, there is also the priest who funnels his sexuality into “spousal love” for the church or who learns to “grieve” his lost physical generativity. These models risk unreality, and they are generally not effective for a genuine formation for celibacy.

The stakes are high, when we consider formation for celibacy. Inadequate formation has led to tragic situations, shattered lives and crises of faith. On the other hand, an adequate formation for celibacy would surface those persons who lack human and sexual integration, the very ones who might harbor psychopathologies that could lead to abuse and other aberrations. And that would be protective for the whole church.

It is not enough to be prepared for the celibate commitment; it is also essential to continuously engage in celibate formation across the span of a lifetime, that is, in the different seasons of one’s life.

A reason for celibacy

I would suggest three kinds of motivating rationales for the celibate commitment. An individual might share in one, two or all three. It may also happen that across a lifetime one or another may gain prominence in a person’s life.

The first rationale can aptly be called mystical. Yves Raguin explored the mystical rationale in his 1974 book, Celibacy for Our Times. Persons experience in a direct way the overwhelming love of God with such power and force that their response to that love must be direct and unmediated. Unlike the experience of most people, who return God’s love in mediated ways, for example in marriage, this direct celibate response means a comprehensive and exclusive love. This rationale might most often belong to those called to the contemplative life.

The second rationale has to do with apostolic availability. The commitment to marriage and family life is powerful, and it evokes Trinitarian love. That same commitment can also restrict the mobility of those who live married life or limit their reach. This rationale clearly belongs to members of religious institutes of consecrated life who embrace a missionary vocation.

The third motivating rationale belongs in a particular way to diocesan priests, even though they may not be entirely consciously aware of it. This rationale is ministerial reliability. I am drawing, in part, from the language and thought of the British psychiatrist and psychoanalyst D. W. Winnicott, who carefully observed and studied the most foundational and comprehensive human relationship that we have: the relationship between mother and child. The key to that relationship, as he describes it, is reliability. If priests want to enter into foundational and comprehensive relationships with their people, moving closely with them in the extraordinary realms of sin and forgiveness, grace, redemption and hope, then they will necessarily need to locate themselves in that relationship with as much reliability as they can muster. The ministerial relationship must simply be what it is supposed to be. When I relate to you in and through my celibate commitment, you should clearly know who I am for you, and you should be able to rely on that.

Formation for celibacy in seminary life and formation in celibacy for those already ordained must regularly return to the motivating reason for embracing this unusual commitment. It is not an ordinary way of life. For that reason, special attention needs to be paid to what grounds it.

Formation for celibacy in seminary life and formation in celibacy for those already ordained must regularly return to the motivating reason for embracing this unusual commitment. It is not an ordinary way of life. For that reason, special attention needs to be paid to what grounds it.

Skills for celibate living

Having a motivating reason for making and sustaining a celibate commitment is essential, but it is also insufficient. It is necessary to learn how to live that commitment well and how to navigate the challenges that it entails. Here, by way of indication, we can begin to see some of these necessary skills for celibate living. They include:

  • a developed capacity for self-reflection; that is, honest introspection focused on personal encounters, relationships and feelings;
  • a capacity for prayerful imagination and prayerful life review that links all one’s activity with the abiding commitment to bring the Lord to his people;
  • an ability to establish personal-relational boundaries and parameters and, at the same time, allow for genuine and generous closeness with others;
  • a capacity to maintain healthy balances, for example between work and play, investment in ministry and detachment from results, self-care and care for others;
  • a learned ability to find necessary and helpful resources, especially in challenging situations;
  • ascetical skills of self-denial, moderation and prudential control, for example in eating, drinking, acquiring things, online activity and entertainment.

Supportive community

Besides a reason and a set of skills, someone who wants to follow the way of celibacy needs a supportive community. It is important to note that a supportive community not only supports and affirms but also, at times, raises questions and challenges. Different forms of community contribute to the life of the celibate priest. Some examples are:

  • the people of God in the church, particularly the community that the priest serves;
  • other priests, who along with the bishop, are brothers and fathers to the priest;
  • the unique community-partnership forged in a relationship with a spiritual director and/or confessor;
  • a prayer group or support group;
  • the personal sphere of friends and family.

Priests are formed for celibacy in the initial formation of the seminary, and they need ongoing formation in celibacy across the years of their priestly ministry. This is the way it must be if the celibate commitment is to be real. When this formation unfolds adequately, priests will have a reason for their celibacy, possess the skills to live it out well and have a supportive-sustaining community.

This article appears in May 27 2019.

The Rev. Louis J. Cameli, a priest of the Archdiocese of Chicago, is Cardinal Blase J. Cupich’s delegate for formation and mission. He is the author of the audiobook Mary’s Journey.