Abstract

Blessed Paul VI’s great encyclical Sacerdotalis caelibatus (24-VI-1967) celebrates its fiftieth anniversary. This article attempts to analyze the text. It considers, first of all, the doctrinal foundations of the ministerial celibacy (its profound theological roots) as they are proposed by the encyclical. Subsequently, the article covers two pastoral aspects, namely, a) the need to impart an adequate formation, in which both the gift of ministerial celibacy and the permanent commitment assumed upon its reception could have an assured place, to candidates for the priesthood; and b) the inseparability between the priest’s chaste life, willingly and wholly offered at the service of God and of the salvation of the mankind, and works of charity.

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