Cardinal-Elector Keith O'Brien, Archbishop of Edinburgh, Scotland:
"For example the celibacy of the clergy, whether priests should marry - Jesus didn't say that. There was a time when priests got married, and of course we know at the present time in some branches of the church - in some branches of the Catholic church - priests can get married, so that is obviously not of divine of origin and it could get discussed again." (BBC, Feb. 22, 2013)
As is well known, priests can never get married in the Catholic Church, unless they are have been "laicized" (removed from ordained ministry). Married men may be ordained to the priesthood in Eastern Churches and, as an exception that is not to be perpetuated, in the Latin Church in the case of those who exercised a priestly-like ministry in some historic Western "ecclesial communities". After priestly ordination, as established from time immemorial, no priest can ever "get married". (Cf. Sacerdotalis caelibatus, 40) And, of course, Our Lord had something to say about this: "For there are eunuchs, who were born so from their mother's womb: and there are eunuchs, who were made so by men: and there are eunuchs, who have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven. He that can take, let him take it." (Cf. Mt. xix)
