when were roman catholic priests forbidden to marry
Clerical celibacy (Catholic Church) The earliest textual evidence of the forbidding of marriage to clerics and the duty of those already married to abstain from sexual contact with their wives is in the fourth-century decrees of the Council of Elvira and the later Council of Carthage (390). According to some writers, this presumed a previous norm, which was being flouted in practice.[15]
Fasting and abstinence in the Catholic Church Contemporary Vatican legislation, which is followed by Catholics of the Latin Rite (who comprise most Catholics) is rooted in the 1966 Apostolic Constitution of Pope Paul VI, Paenitemini, and codified in the 1983 Code of Canon Law (in Canons 1249â€“1253). According to Paenitemini and the 1983 Code of Canon Law, on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, both abstinence and fasting are required of Catholics who are not exempted for various reasons. All Fridays of the year are days are bound by the law of abstinence on all Fridays that are not Solemnities, while the law of fasting binds all Catholics who are aged between eighteen and sixty on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday.[1] Nevertheless, both Paenitemini and the 1983 Code of Canon Law permitted the Episcopal Conferences to propose adjustments of the laws on fasting and abstinence for their home territories, and most have done so. For example, in some countries, the Bishops' Conferences have obtained from Rome the substitution of pious or charitable acts for abstinence from meat on all Fridays of the year (including Fridays of Lent) except Good Friday. Others continue to abstain from eating meat on Lenten Fridays, but not on Fridays outside of Lent. Still others voluntarily abstain from meat on however, fasting may be less stringent on Holy Saturday than on Good Friday.[2]