ABOLISH CELIBACY, POPE IS URGED BY MORALES

BOLIVIAN PRESIDENT MEETS BENEDICT XVI
ASKS POPE TO ABOLISH PRIESTLY CELIBACY

VATICAN CITY (AP) - Bolivian President Evo Morales said in a meeting yesterday with Pope Benedict XVI that the Catholic Church should abolish celibacy vows for priests. Morales said after the meeting that he had made the appeal as a member of the “grass-roots Catholic Church”. The Pope received on Monday in the Vatican the president of Bolivia, who handed him a letter asking for the abolition of priestly celibacy and the admission of women to the priesthood. After an audience lasting 25 minutes, Morales with the aid of an interpreter announced the delivery of the letter in the pontiff’s private library. In the note, Morales described himself as a “member of the Catholic Church” and after reflecting “on the lessons of Our Lord Jesus Christ about love, justice, equality and devotion to our fellow man,” he decided to “very respectfully propose to the pope the need to overcome the crisis in the church, which, as you said, is wounded and sinful.” “To do that it is essential to democratize and humanize its clerical structure. Democratize it so that the same religious rights are acknowledged for all God’s sons and daughters and allowing women to have the same opportunities as men to fully exercise the priesthood,” he wrote.

Morales added in the missive that “The church must not deny a fundamental part of our human nature and must abolish (priestly) celibacy so that it will have fewer children not recognised by their fathers. “In the same way and with much decisiveness we must protect our children from those who take advantage of the trust that a priest inspires to abuse them. Those guilty of such atrocities not only commit sins but also crimes,” he said. Morales said he was convinced that the pope will consider “with wisdom” his proposals, with which he “humbly seeks to help heal the church’s wounds.”


For materialistic man, the greatest joy in life is sex and he can not understand the pleasure that a person experiences on the spiritual path. It is said that: “What is day for the materialistic person is night for the spiritualist. What is very sweet for the materialist (women and money) is regarded as poison by the spiritualist.”

WHAT DO THE VEDIC TEACHINGS TELL US?

Throughout his life, the gross materialist who is constantly after sense gratification spends all day earning his livelihood to maintain his family, and at night he wastes his energy in sex enjoyment ... Although differently graded as businessmen, lawyers, politicians, professors, judges, coolies, pickpockets, laborers and so on, materialists all simply engage in eating, sleeping, fearing and sense gratification and thus spoil their valuable lives pursuing luxury and neglecting to perfect their lives through spiritual realization. Yogīs, however, try to perfect their lives, and therefore the Bhagavad-gītā enjoins that everyone should become a yogī.

Śrīla A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupāda :
“Śrī Caitanya Caritāmrita”
Purport in “Ādi-līlā Chapter 5 Verse 22”