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tom, Priest-Psychiatrist Says
maintenance of the health and
equilibrum of a subject.” The sexual
impulse, he went on, is strong, but not
compelling, and the celibate
st ate .although it is not the spontaneous
tendency of man, is not ‘against
nature,’ in the habitual and strong sense
of that term.”
However, Father Oraison continued,
man’s ability to surmount his sexual
drives depends on the attainment of a
“sufficient psychic maturity” and, in
order to surmount those drives, a man
must “find himself at ease, satisfied, in a
situation of sufficient dynamic
fulfillment in the concrete existence
that he leads.”
The feeling of “realizing himself,”
and of “being recognized” by others,
“the positive impression of occupying a
real and fruitful place in the concrete
network of human relations” are the
conditions that make possible a
“normal” celibacy.
WHEN THE human being, Father
Oraison added, finds himself in
situations of great unrest or stress, the
sexual drive tends to intensify.
The second observation that modem
research has to make on the matter of
sexuality, Father Oraison said, is that it
is no longer to be treated or considered
in terms of “pure” and “impure,”
according to which everything sexual is,
of itself, “bad.” Therefore, he said, “it
is evident that one cannot argue, at the
present time, in favor of an obligatory
celibacy for priests by basing- the
argument on the notion that marriage is
less ‘pure.’ ” -
The problem,.he said, is at the same
time more practical and more mystical:
“witness by celibacy of a ‘transsexual’
mode of love, which is that of the world
of the Resurrection.”
He noted that marriage and the
priesthood are not incompatible.
Married men could be priests, he said,
and theirs would not be 'a “second-
rate” priesthood; it would merely have a
role and a significance that were
different.
Father Oraison added that it has
become “indisputably clear that the
presence of Christ in time for men who
believe in Him is changing completely”
and that the unrest arising from this
cannot- be ignored or minimized.
Resolving the problem, he said, will
require the efforts of all, both priests
and laity.
THE PROBLEM, however, will not
be solved by allowing priests to marry
and to continue their ministry, he
maintained.
“Church authorities,” he said, “if
they allowed priests already engaged in
the ministry to marry and continue that
ministry, would in my opinion commit
an error that they otherwise keep from
committing. That would come down to
confirming this idea that celibacy as
such is unlivable and abnormal, which is
clinically false. But that would
especially come down to hot
recognizing that the problem is much
more vast and to not having the courage
to call into question the structures of
which institutional celibacy is only one
aspect.”
What is required, he continued, “in
order to announce Christ to the men He
came to save” is passing beyond “the
age-old organization of the ‘sacred’
type... that was the ‘clergy’ to an
organization different in its very spirit,
and of the missionary type.”
For priests, he said, the unrest
created by these changing times requires
that they rediscover a basic mode of
relating themselves again to the human
situation, “for example, in professional
activity.”
He added: “It is more important for
them to have the feeling of existing for
a great number of others than for a
single person. To marry because one has
‘made a mess of his life’ is never a
solution nor a very good thing. If he
finds this human insertion in the
content in which he lives, his presence
to others-and the experience that he
will have of it— will progressively cease
to be ‘clerical,’ that is to say, worthless,
and will become simply Christian, that
is to say, properly speaking,
missionary.”
LAY PEOPLE,, Father Oraison said,
can help in this process of
“declergification” by avoiding making
priests something sacred, by seeking to
establish with priests normal relations
between equal adults, by not regarding
priests’ celibacy “as a sort of magic
conjuration o'f sexuality, but as a
condition of life often chosen because
better suited to what one wants to do.”
With regard to the merarchy, Father
Oraison said that. it is necessary for
bishops to realize that the concept of
the bishop as a great Lord, imperial
ruler or “paterfamilias,” is no longer
valid.
The “vertical” relationship, he said,
of father to children, which prevailed
formerly, must give way to a
“horizontal” relationship around the
bishop who is the servant of all.
“Priests in difficulty,” he said,
“should be able to speak to the bishop
about their problems in the liberty of a
dialogue, not as son to father, but as
man to man, between people who know
each other and who work together to let.
the world know that it has been saved
by Christ.”
Father Oraison concluded: “The
trees must not hide the forest: it is first
of all the ‘system,’ and not celibacy,
that has to be rethought.”
Passage Of Rights Package
concerning the defeated law in
Delaware.
Promotion of fair housing laws
often involves, at least indirectly,
campaigns of education designed
to change the racial attitudes of
citizens. Along the same lines,
religious leaders of nearly every
denomination have repeatedly
made statements branding
housing segregation as
un-Christian.
One man whose position on the
issue has seemed ambiguous is a
Catholic priest, Father Francis X.
Lawlor, O.S.A. He was
transferred out of Chicago and
called a “subtle racist” by
Negro priests because of his work
on the city’s southwest side, a
neighborhood rapidly becoming
all Negro. The priest has returned
to Chicago and resumed his work
without Church authorization.
HIS TECHNIQUE is to
organize “block clubs” in white
neighborhoods and persuade
white families not to move out.
His stated purpose is not to
prevent integration but rather to
prevent all-white neighborhoods
from becoming all-Negro. Father
Lawlor claims that blocks are
“changing” in Chicago at a rate
of four per week.
Some supporters of open
housing in Chicago consider the
priest sincere though perhaps
misguided. They have two
criticisms of his system: 1. It
does not work; 2. Extremist
groups are exploiting some of his
clubs for their own purposes.
Paralleling white opposition to
integrated housing is a growing
negative attitude on the subject
among some Negroes. Militants
often reject integrated housing in
a general rejection of white
society. Others find that
segregated housing has helped to
strengthen a sense of community
among Negroes and some
consider Negro concentration in
certain areas a key strategic
element in securing Negro
control, either through the ballot
or through demonstrations.
POET LEROI Jones, a
nationally-known militant leader,
who is presently appealing a
conviction for illegal possession
of firearms during last Summer’s
Newark riots, provides a
convenient index of changing
attitudes.
During the nationwide
disturbances that followed Dr.
King’s death, Jones spent
considerable time and energy in
efforts to “cool it” among
Newark’s militants. He explained
later that one of his reasons for
this largely successful effort was
to avoid giving pretexts for police
brutality.
But he added that he did not
believe violence was necessary.
“We have the votes,” he said,
indicating that segregated housing
had made Newark’s population
almost two-thirds Negro.
With Negro mayors in two large
Northern cities and the election
of Negroes predicted in dozens of
others, housing segregation takes
on a different meaning. When this
meaning becomes clear, the cause
of integration may win some
surprising new adherents who
were not persuaded previously by
their churches or by legislation.
OFFICERS of the Associated Church Press and Catholic Press Association made plans for their first joint meeting May zi-ze, ivoy, m
Atlanta. From left, are Alfred P. Klausler, ACP’s executive secretary; Msgr. Terrence P. McMahon of the Catholic Transcript, Hartford,
Conn., president of the CPA; Dr. W.C. Fields, public relations secretary of the Southern Baptist Convention and president of the ACP; and
James A. Doyle, executive director of the CPA. The joint planning session was held in Washington during the annual meeting of the ACP.
Formerly a Protestant and Orthodox group, the Associated Church Press now has five Catholic members. (RNS Photo).