Giving a Piece of My Mind on Roman Catholics Defending Their Erroneous Priesthood

While I was still a Roman Catholic, studying the Old Testament gave me a lot of headaches. One of the most important issues was the priesthood. So I have read Roman Catholics who say, "Well look at the Old Testament, we have the priesthood." while hypocritically changing their stance anytime like saying, "Well that's just Old Testament." They're really double-minded like they say born again Christians teach a "license to sin" in one moment but in another moment they say born again Christians are legalistic people who don't know how to have fun. I'd like to talk about the Roman Catholic priesthood form an approved Roman Catholic translation. I'll be using verses from the Good News Translation (GNT) throughout this entry unless specified. 

So they justify their wearing of robes from the Old Testament. I'd like to point them out that true the Old Testament priests wore robes and miters. After reading through Leviticus, the more I see that while they do have miters, robes, purple and scarlet but there's a whole lot of stuff MISSING from their uniforms. But I'd not stick too much to that compared to other stuff more important than the garments. 

I'd like to talk about celibacy as well. Roman Catholics tend to quote 1 Corinthians 7 out of context especially verses 32-34. But what might be easily forgotten is that the same chapter that says single people can serve God better is that the Bible doesn't mean unmarried people can't serve the Lord. Verse 35 says, "I am saying this because I want to help you. I am not trying to put restrictions on you. Instead, I want you to do what is right and proper, and to give yourselves completely to the Lord's service without any reservation." Yet the Roman Catholic priesthood demands celibacy.

Do you know God demanded the Old Testament priests to be married? Roman Catholic apologists tend to tell me to read Leviticus and I just did. Leviticus 21:7 says, "A priest shall not marry a woman who has been a prostitute or a woman who is not a virgin or who is divorced; he is holy." It didn't say, "A priest may marry." but "A priest shall marry." It's a command that God required the priests to be married. This was a clever plan to perpetuate the Old Testament priesthood. Did they know that when Aaron died, his son Eleazar became the next high priest? The Old Testament priesthood was composed of family men from the line of Aaron. Then again, I expect many Roman Catholics to tell me, "But that's Old Testament!"

The New Testament doesn't require any more priesthood because Jesus is the Great High Priest now. Instead, Ephesians 4:11-12 says, "It was He who gave gifts to people; He appointed some to be apostles, others to be prophets, others to be evangelists, others to be pastors and teachers. He did this to prepare all God's people for the work of Christian service, in order to build up the body of Christ." You can't see the word "priest" there but you can see the word "pastor". And as for them maligning the office of pastor by quoting from the King James, I'll just quote Jeremiah 3:16 also from the King James before I'll go back to quoting from the GNT which says, "And I will give you pastors according to Mine heart, which shall feed you with knowledge and understanding." Yes God condemned the corrupt pastors but He also promised to give pastors according to His heart. Then will Roman Catholics say, "Well that's our priests." But in saying so, I can only tell them they condemned themselves with their habitual change of stance whenever it's convenient.

1 Timothy 3:2 says, "A church leader must be without fault; he must have only one wife, be sober, self-controlled, and orderly; he must welcome strangers in his home; he must be able to teach;" The church leader is required to be a husband of one wife. Now Paul may have been a celibate but he may have married after writing his letters to the Corinthians. The Bible is silent whether Paul later got married or not but one thing was certain, he wrote that the church leaders were to be family men. Going down to verse 5, it says, "For if a man does not know how to manage his own family, how can he take care of the church of God?" While Roman Catholics may go ahead and say, "Again read 1 Corinthians 7:32-34." but I'm afraid many of them just keep missing the point. The Bible really requires church leaders to be married not celibate.

Now is celibacy a sin in itself? Not at all but if God requires marriage then one must comply with it. Priests were required to marry in the Old Testament and pastors were required to marry in the New Testament. But to enforce celibacy is a doctrine of demons (1 Timothy 4:3). Roman Catholics have tried to spin around that verse several times saying that Paul allowed celibacy. Yes, Paul allowed celibacy in some Christian workers but the problem is enforced celibacy. No matter how they try to debate 1 Corinthians 7:32-34 they're just taking it out of context.