Ofwono Opondo should not mislead Catholics

Apr 11, 2013

This is a response to Ofwono Opondo’s opinion in the New Vision of April 3.This is a response to Ofwono Opondo’s opinion in the New Vision of April 3.

By Aloysius Kayiwa

This is a response to Ofwono Opondo’s opinion in the New Vision of April 3.

It is unfortunate people tend to define celibacy based on what it has "given up" rather than what it has embraced and a lot of confusion could be avoided, if we described the celibate vocation as the "heavenly marriage.” There are also lots of people who never think of God and sex in the same sentence, unless that sentence begins with the words ‘God doesn’t like...’

These would be better informed, if they turn to John Paul II’s Theology of the Body which shows how the call to celibacy affirms the goodness of sexuality rather than diminishing or rejecting it. The celibate doesn’t reject sexuality, but rather uses it to make a gift of self to Christ and his Church. Love is what drives us to give, whether be it in marriage or in celibacy. Celibacy affirms the goodness of the sexual act by sacrificing it for the sake of the kingdom. If sex were something ‘bad’ then giving it up wouldn’t be extraordinary, but rather expected of every Christian. The very goodness of the sexual act is what makes its renunciation by the celibate so valuable.

You get a very different image when you look in Scripture at the Song of Songs and at the many commentaries written on the Song of Songs, where you see marriage as the image of the spousal love that exists between the soul and God, between the Church and God. God’s plan from all eternity is to "marry" us (see Hosea 2:19). And this eternal plan was foreshadowed and revealed "from the beginning" by our creation as male and female and our call to become "one flesh." The human body has a "nuptial meaning,” because it proclaims and reveals God's eternal plan of love his plan for nuptial union between man and woman and, analogously speaking, between Christ and the Church.

"For this reason, a man shall leave his father and mother, and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This is a great mystery, and I mean in reference to Christ and the Church" (Eph 5:31, 32).

Christ left his Father in heaven. He left the home of his mother on earth to give up his body for his Bride, so that we might become "one flesh" with him and be taken up into the life of the Trinity for all eternity. Only by looking towards this heavenly reality can we properly understand the celibate vocation as Christ intends it. Christ doesn't call some of his followers to embrace celibacy for celibacy's sake, but "for the sake of the kingdom."Everyone is called to a life of holiness by responding to the call to "nuptial love" stamped in his body. But not everyone is called in the same way. "Each has a particular gift from God, one of one kind and one of another" (1Co 7:7).

Each person should respond to the gift he's been given. If one is called to celibacy, then he shouldn't choose marriage. If one is called to marriage, then he shouldn't choose celibacy. Hence the important need to discern one's vocation prayerfully.

It is precisely "masters of suspicion" who contend that celibacy is to blame for the various sexual problems of the clergy. "Celibacy is simply unnatural," they say.

In some sense these people are right to say celibacy isn't natural. As the saying goes, and as Christ reveals, it's supernatural. It is celibacy for the sake of the kingdom. By calling some to renounce the natural call to marriage, Christ established an entirely new way of life, and, demonstrated the power of the Cross to transform lives. For those who are "stuck" in a fallen view of the sexual urge with no concept of the freedom to which we're called in Christ, the idea of life-long celibacy is complete nonsense. But for those who have experienced the transformation of their sexual desires in Christ, the idea of making a complete gift of one's sexuality to God not only becomes a possibility, it becomes very attractive.

Celibacy is a grace, a gift. A minority of Christ's followers are called to embrace this gift. But, to those who are given this gift, they are also given the grace to be faithful to their vows, just as married people are given the grace to be faithful to their vows. In both vocations people can and do reject this grace and violate their vows. But the solution to marital and celibate infidelity is not to concede to human weakness and redefine the nature of the commitments.

The solution is to point to the Cross as the font of grace that it is a font from which we can drink freely and receive real power to live and love as were called. Furthermore, the statistical rate of sexual misconduct among celibate priests is no higher than that of married clergy in other Christian denominations. There is simply no evidence that having a married clergy would solve or even alleviate this problem.

There's also a dangerously misguided idea that marriage is the solution to the sexual scandal of some priests. Marriage does not provide a "legitimate outlet" for disordered sexual desire. Married people, no less than celibates, must come to experience the redemption of their sexual desires in Christ. Only then can they love each other in God's image. If a man were to enter marriage with deep-seated sexual disorders, he would be condemning his wife to a life of sexual objectification.

Celibacy does not cause sexual disorder. Sin does. Simply getting married does not cure sexual disorder. Christ does. The only way the scandal of sexual sin (whether committed by priests or others) will end is if people experience the redemption of their sexuality in Jesus.

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