Russell Arnett remembers the day he proposed to his wife.
The Burlington-area resident made a reservation at a nice restaurant and he had roses and a card waiting for her.
It’s a story many people tell about their lives, but it’s not a story most Catholic priests ever have the chance to tell because most Catholic priests are not allowed to marry.
But Arnett will soon become one of very few married Catholic priests able to tell that story.
[blockquote]most Catholic priests are not allowed to marry.[/blockquote]
Ugh.. Let’s try it again, shall we? NO Catholic Priests are allowed to marry (although I’m sure there are some obscure exceptions). SOME Catholic Priests are married BEFORE they become Catholic Priests (such as Fr Arnett). Is it REALLY that hard for journalists to get such a basic thing correct?
Latin rite Catholic priests are not allowed to marry. Eastern rite Catholics priests can be married – so this article is correct, since Eastern right Catholic churches are in full communion with Rome and are part of the worldwide Catholic Church. Some Eastern Catholic rites require that marriage occur before ordination, and all (I think) require that a bishop be unmarried.
Branford,
This presumably explains why many (if not most) Eastern Rite and Orthodox bishops are originally monastics.
Branford at #2. If the EC’s practice is the same as the Orthodox, and it’s probably safe to assume that it is, then deacons and priests may be married as long as they are married before ordination. Bishops are drawn from the ranks of the celibate, either unmarried/widowed “secular” priests or priest-moinks.
Of all the Eastern churches (Catholic, Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox and “Assyrian” – aka “Nestorian”), only the last permits deacons and priests to marry (and remarry, if widowed) after ordination, as well as before (although Asyrian bishops must be celibate monks, just as the bishops of all those other Eastern churches); in the others, a married man may be ordained a deacon or a priest, but may not marry or remarry after ordination.
When the greater part of the “Nestorians” entered into communion with Rome between the 1780s and 1805 (forming the “Chaldean Catholic Church”) they were required to adopt the discipline of the other Eastern churches — no marriage or remarriage after ordination.
Rev. Arnett became the rector of St.James in 2002. I don’t know when he left. (St. James is now patored by Rev (Deacon) Cathy Milliken.) Things were going quite well up to 2006 and then serious declines in Members, ASA, and Plate & Pledge (inflation adjusted) began. But problems have not be strangers to the diocese of Milwaukee. From 2002 through 2009, the diocese lost 23.4 percent of Members, 24.6 percent of ASA, and 15.7 percent of Plate & Pledge (inflation adjusted). I ranked the diocese at 80 of 95 considered. And longer term stats are also bleak. For 2002 through 2009, the diocese had Infant Baptisms decline by 22.9 percent and Marriages decline by 43.7 percent. For Bishop Miller these stats sort of take the spotlight off of Rev. Arnett’s marital status. Statmann