Priests, Marriage of. The obligation of perpet- ual virginity imposed by the Church ot' Rome upon those who receive higher orders has been spoken of in another article. See ( i u i:\rv. In the ancient Church married men (but no bigamists) were sometimes re- ceived into priesthood, without dissolution of their mat- rimony; but it was never allowed to one who bad n- ceived higher orders to marry. If such a case occurred, the service of the Church had to be renounced. In lie- West we find, in the middle of the 10th century (Cone August. can. I), the ordinance that the bishops1 priests, deacons, and Bubdeacons who contract marriage are to be d< p ised from their functions. Hence it would seem plain that the order.- were not then considered as an impediment to marriage, while the solemn VOW was considered as such i '',,,„■. Troisliens, cap. i. a. 909). The Lateran Council of 1123 declares the matrimony contracted by a priesf, etc.. as one to be dissol jungi, can. 21 I; that of 1139 declares it not existing at all (mafrimonium non esse censemus, can. 7). I'he Council of Trent (sess. xxiv. can. 9) repeated the same declaration, and. in virtue of the powers of the Church (can. 4, 1. c), puts the orders again into the number of the dissolving impediments to matrimony. The same council decreed, further, that sons of clergymen cannot discharge a clerical function in a place where their fa- ther is or was in office (sess. xxv, cap. 1-'.. I), ,,/.\. The Creek Church imposes celibacy on the higher dignita- ries— the bishops — but not on the priests and lower functionaries of the Church. The latter cannot, it i- true, marry alter receiving the orders, but are allowed to continue in the matrimonial relations contracted be- fore ordination. But no second marriage i- tolerated. The Russian < hurch. however, refuse- ordination to Iter priests as loii",- as they are unmarried, i. e. ordains only married men. If the priest becomes a widower, he re- tires to monastic life. In the Greek Oriental Church there are unmarried priests : they remain in office after the death of their wives, unless they prefer to marry
again. In Greece married priests are distinguished from iin unmarried one- by their head-gear : the former w ear very low round hat-. See Lea. Sacerdotal Celibacy i In- dex, under Marriage).
Priests' Rooms. The chaplains in Great Britain frequently had chambers over porches or sacristies, as at St. Peter's-in-the-EaSt, Oxford: in Ireland, over the vault of the church, as at Cashel, Mellifont, Holj Cross, and Kilkenny: in Scotland, at lona, over the aisles. Walcott, Sacred Archaology, s. v.
Prileszky, Johs Baptist, a learned Hungarian Jesuit, wa- born at l'rile— March 16, 1709, and. after attaining to the doctorate in philosophy and theology, taught in several colleges of his order. He was for live years chancellor of the 1 Iniversity of Tyrnau. lie died after 177.;. He wrote. Acta Sanctorum Bungaria (Tyrnau, 171:'. li. Bvo Votitia Sanctorum Patrum trium priorum 8aculorum (ibid. 1759): Icta et Scrip- 1,1 s. ( ypriani | ibid. 1761, fol.) v—Acta ri Scripta 8. ll„- ophili, Patriarcha - 1 ntiochi ni i ( MinutU I '< fii is I \ i. nna, 1764, 8vo) : Acta <i Scripta S. Irenai | Kaschau, 1765, 8vo):— Acta e!Sct ipia S. GregoriiNeo-t 'a sarit ruw, I>»u-
PRIMACY
5S7
PRIMACY
yeii A lexandrini et Methodii Lycii (ibid. 17G6, 8vo).— Hoefer, Nouv. Bioy. General?, s. v.
Primacy is the office held (1) by him who is the pope of Rome, and therefore highest in the Christian Church, according to those who accept the assertions of the papacy ; and (2) by him who is next in rank to the patriarch (q. v.). See Pkimate.
The primacy of Peter, as the pope's office is some- times styled, Romanists claim to be of divine appoint- ment. They assert that the apostle Peter, by Christ's authority, had a primacy or sovereign authority and jurisdiction over the other apostles. Since the God- man Jesus the Christ, they say, has himself willed the continuance of the Church and her fundamental unity, Peter and his successors were also established by the will of God. The power to bind and to loose [see Keys, Pow'eii of the] was given to the apostles in a body (Matt, xviii, 8) ; but, in order to preserve their power and unity, Peter was put at their head and en- dowed with higher honors (Matt, xvi, 1G-18; xvii, 4, etc.). He became the primus inter pares, not so much for his own sake as for a precedent ; li for it would be unreasonable," says Sauter, " to consider the primacy he held to have died with him, in view of the end for which Christ had appointed him to it. It appears, on the con- trary, that Christ instituted the primacy more in view of the future than to meet the requirements of the apos- tolic times, when the personal purity of each of the apostles rendered such a measure less necessary" (Funda- ment a jiu is eccksiastici Catholicorum [3d ed. Rotwila?, 1825], § 62; see also Zeitschrift fitr Phil, wad lath. Theoloyie [Cologne, 1832], iv, 121, 122). By the ex- ample of Peter. Christ showed, in a general way, that some one of the bishops was always to be considered as primate by the others; but, add those who put a lib- eral interpretation on the Romish assertion of suprem- acy, it is by no means clear from the writings of the primitive fathers that the primacy was attached to a particular bishopric. Circumstances favored Pome, whose bishop was acknowledged by the other bishops as the successor of Peter (in the primacy). The bish- ops of Pome cannot have the primacy by divine ap- pointment, but in a mediate manner, so that, when the good of the Church demands it, it can be transferred to another of the bishops (Sauter, § G3, 64). But the Ultramontanes maintain that by the same authority by which Peter was set apart for the supremacy his own successors were also established. Peter, it is true, founded different communities and provided them with bishops, yet no other can be considered as his true suc- cessor than he who succeeded him after his death, and this is the bishop of Pome. The Roman bishop had, by his Roman episcopal dignity, a right similar to that in virtue of which the next relation succeeds in worldly principalities, and the Ultramontanes assert that Peter himself chose for his successor, in all his dig- nities, the same Linus mentioned by Paul in his Second Epistle to Timothy, iv, 21 (Phillips, Kirchenrecht, i, 146). This system of ideas, so simple in appearance, has only by decrees developed itself and obtained dogmatical sanction in the Latin Church. It is based on facts which have been variously appreciated, and on deci- sions which have by no means received the same in- terpretation at all hands. The whole deduction is founded on arbitrary declarations, inasmuch as the bishops were, and are still, party and judge in the same cause; they, whose title is in question, claim the exclu- sive right of explaining words and facts, and consider any one who doubts their assertions as being disobedient to Christ and to God. Impartial thinkers of the Roman Church itself cannot help acknowledging that before the middle of the 3d century there was no primacy perceptible in the Church (see Mohler, Die Einheit der Kirche, oder das Prinzip des Katholicismus, daryestellt im. Geiste der Kirchenverfassuny der drei ersten Jahr- Iiiiiid! >■/,■ | 2d ed. Tubingen, 1843]) : while others, by ar- bitrary arrangement of historical facts, arrive at the