“We are overjoyed”: reaction to pope lifting ban on ordaining married men as Eastern Catholic priests

This news got a lot of attention earlier in the week, and reaction has been overwhelmingly positive:

The Vatican has lifted its ban on the ordination of married men to the priesthood in Eastern Catholic churches outside their traditional territories, including in the United States, Canada and Australia.

Cardinal Leonardo Sandri, prefect of the Congregation for the Eastern Churches, signed the decree on 14 June. It was published later online in theActa Apostolicae Sedis, the official periodical through which Vatican laws and decisions are published.

The new law says the pope concedes to Eastern Catholic bishops outside their traditional territory the faculties to “allow pastoral service of Eastern married clergy” and “to ordain Eastern married candidates” in their eparchies or dioceses, although they must inform the local Latin-rite bishop in writing “in order to have his opinion and any relevant information.”

“We are overjoyed with the lifting of the ban,” Melkite Bishop Nicholas Samra of Newton, Mass., told Catholic News Service in a 15 November email.

The Vatican decree explained that in response to the “protests” of the Latin-rite bishops in the United States, in 1890 the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples prohibited married Ruthenian priests from living in the United States. And in 1929-30, the Congregation for Eastern Churches extended the ban to all Eastern-rite priests throughout North America, South America and Australia.

The 1929 prohibition, known as Cum data fuerit, had significant repercussions for the Eastern Catholic churches in the United States. Sandri’s decree noted that soon after the law was promulgated, “an estimated 200,000 Ruthenian faithful became Orthodox.”

Ruthenian Bishop John Kudrick of Parma, Ohio, said 16 November that he sees the end to imposed celibacy for Eastern priests in the diaspora as an acknowledgement of the Eastern churches’ “obligation to maintain their integrity” and “of the right of the various churches to equal responsibility of evangelization throughout the world.”

And now there’s this: 

Bishop Kudrick said Eastern churches in the diaspora have a responsibility to minister to new immigrants, who are accustomed to married priests.

“Because of the dual responsibilities to maintain continuity with our past and to reach out to the society to which we are called, some degree of freedom is necessary,” he said.

Fr Alexander Laschuk, a canon lawyer, said the new decree also “regularises a situation” in which some Eastern married men were being ordained despite the 1929 law. Fr Laschuk is a Ukrainian Catholic married priest and university lecturer, who also works for the regional tribunal of the Archdiocese of Toronto.

…“From a canonical point of view, the new legislation puts into universal law the possibility of [Eastern Catholic] married men being ordained throughout the world,” Fr Laschuk said, with the full faculty to ordain granted to each Eastern Catholic ordinary within his diocese.

Jesuit Fr Brian Daley, a long-term member of the North American Catholic-Orthodox Theological Consultation, said he expected the new legislation will have a “very positive” impact on ecumenical relations. For many Eastern Catholics and Orthodox, he said, the ban “has been a wound and a source of resentment”.

…Fr Laschuk said he also hopes the new legislation will create a culture in the Church in North America in which married clergy are more welcome.

“Previously, there were cases where married priests were not treated fully as priests, as if they were somewhat less,” he said. “I hope this will grant them greater respect, now that the Holy Father has approved it.”