Why do Catholic priests not marry?
Jesus said this about remaining unmarried: It is not everyone who can accept what I have said, but only those to whom it is granted. There are eunuchs born so from their mother’s womb, there are eunuchs made so by human agency, and there are eunuchs who have made themselves so for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven. Let anyone accept this who can (Matt 19:11-12). The Church has always interpreted this, not as an endorsement of actual physical mutilation, but as an encouragement to chastity by those who accept God’s call to serve only Him. In his first letter to the Corinthians, St. Paul says the same thing: I should like you to have your minds free from all worry. The unmarried man gives his mind to the Lord’s affairs and to how he can please the Lord, but the man who is married gives his mind to the world and to how he can please his wife, and he is divided in mind. So, too, the unmarried woman, and the virgin, gives her mind to the Lord’s affairs and to being holy in body and in spiri
