Milwaukee Archbishop Considers Ordaining Married Men
Episcopal News Service. January 25, 1991 [91024K]
Roman Catholic Archbishop Rembert Weakland, no stranger to the spotlight of controversy, said he would ask the pope's permission to ordain a qualified married man if a shortage of priests prompted the closing of a viable parish within his archdiocese. The Milwaukee archbishop, saying "I see... no other way out of this very difficult situation," made his views known in a published draft of a pastoral letter. The 6,000-word letter sought to anticipate diocesan hardships in the face of an expected substantial decline in the number of U.S. Roman Catholic priests over the next decade. Weakland will issue a final version of the pastoral letter in six months, following further dialogue with other members of his archdiocese. Pope John Paul II has repeatedly defended the celibacy requirement for priests as part of the Western Roman Catholic tradition. Married priests are allowed in Eastern Rite Roman Catholicism.