VATICAN CITY - The Vatican confirmed yesterday that opening the door to married Anglican priests does not mean that the Roman Catholic Church is easing the requirement of celibacy for its clergy.
The press office of the Holy See released rules and guidelines, known as an apostolic constitution, as part of efforts to make it easier for disillusioned, traditionalist Anglicans to be received into the Roman Catholic Church.
Under the Vatican’s initiative, Anglicans who are upset by their own church’s embrace of openly gay clerics, women priests, and blessing of same-sex unions, can join new parishes, called “personal ordinariates’’ and headed by former Anglican clergy.
Vatican officials had previously stressed that married Anglican priests would be allowed to remain in the priesthood on a case-by-case basis.
Still, the Vatican’s decision to allow Anglicans to keep some aspects of their liturgy and identity had raised questions over whether the Roman Catholic requirement for celibacy might change. Yesterday, the Vatican reaffirmed its resolve to leave the celibacy rule unchanged.
“The possibility envisioned by the Apostolic Constitution for some married clergy within the personal ordinariates does not signify any change in the church’s discipline of clerical celibacy,’’ the Vatican said.
Simply assimilating Anglicans in existing dioceses would have led to the “loss of the richness of their Anglican tradition,’’ the Vatican said.
The rules also confirmed that while married Anglican bishops could be ordained as priests after converting to Roman Catholicism, they will lose the status of bishop. But Rome said these former bishops could be invited to participate in meetings of local Catholic bishops’ conferences.
