Obligatory Celibat and Sexual Purity of the Roman Catholic Priests in the Imagination and Evaluation of High School and University Students in Poland

Abstract

In this article, I present the attitudes and  evaluations of high school and academic youth towards the obligatory celibacy and sexual purity of Roman Catholic priests. The basis for this presentation are the results of my sociological research, which I carried out among respondents with selected statistical techniques representing both categories of youth in the second half of the twentieth century and in the second decade of this century. Altogether, 976 high school students (637 women and 339 men) and 546 students (327 women and 219 men) participated in all of the studies, and in total - 1522 respondents, including 964 women and 558 men. Respondents represented the first and the third year of their respective study. Research has shown that the majority of high school and university students oppose the inclusion of obligatory celibacy of all priests, and one third advocate for its voluntary election by priests who feel the predisposition of living in solitude and permanent sexual abstinence. Priests feeling the call to marriage and family should be able to combine this vocation with a vocation to the priesthood. Most of the respondents point out that the obligatory priests’ celibacy contributes to the systematic regress of the number of candidates for the priesthood, as well as the priests’ abandonment of the priesthood. The same percentage of respondents accept married priests and their families. According to respondents, the costs of maintaining such priests and their families belong to the bishop and parishioners. The obligatory celibacy and total obedience of ecclesiastical authority violate the personal freedom and autonomy of the priest’s decision. Gender does not make any significant difference in the attitude of respondents to celibacy and sexual purity of priests. Greater diversity is represented by the type of school – university students are more critical in this matter than high school students. The greatest impact on the critical and positive attitude towards celibacy have declarations of faith and religious practices of high school students and university students. Respondents who are deeply religious and systematically practicing rarely criticize the duty of celibacy, and more often advocate its necessity. Respondents who are either indifferent religiously or identify themselves as non-believers are generally opposed to celibacy of priests and see in it a factor violating the priest's freedom and personal dignity.