VATICAN REVEALS POPE'S SECRET CELIBACY PLEA

BY A SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT
POPE PAUL appealed to
leaders of the Church in Holland to defend the law of priestly celibacy in a letter sent to Cardinal Alfrink, the Dutch Primate, and the other Dutch bishops two weeks before the meeting of the Dutch Pastoral Council which voted last week to abolish it.
Cardinal Alfrink and the other bishops abstained from voting on the recommendation that the obligation of permanent celibacy should no longer be a condition of ordination to the priesthood. But none of them urged defeat of the motion.
Of the 106 members of the council entitled to vote. 90 were in favour of the recommendation and six against, with 10
abstentions, including the bishops. 1 his was well above the required two-thirds majority.
Only one of the bishops voted for a resolution to admit women to the priesthood.
'SOURCE OF JOY'
A further recommendation was that priests who wish to marry or have already done SO should. under certain conditions, be allowed to continue to exercise their priestly function or return to it." 1 his was
passed • by 86 to 3, with 17 abstentions.
In his 1,500-word letter, published on Monday by the Vatican newspaper L'Osserva. fore Romano, urged the bishops to teach with clarity and firmness" that priestly celibacy was not only possible, but also a source of joy and holiness."
Mgr. Angelo Felici, the Papal Nuncio to Holland, was absent from the meeting. Vatican sources said that this was because the Pope had ordered him to stay away because he disapproved of proposals to he put at the meeting.
The Pope's letter, sent on December 24, warned the bishops of "the danger of deviation" in Dutch Catholicism from Church orthodoxy. It was one of the strongest rebukes he has directed at the Dutch Church.
The Pope said he felt concern because the working papers for the council meeting described the ends and tasks of the church as though its mission were "purely earthly."
'DEPLORABLE
One paper dealing with members of religious orders he
described as containing "ambiguities and doctrinal deficiencies that threaten to produce deplorable consequences."
The letter went on: "In the face of the danger of deviations that could be gravely damaging for the faith of the Catholic people of the Low Countries, the awareness of our responsibility as pastor of the Universal Church obliges us to ask you, with all frankness: What do you think we can do to come to your help, to increase your authority, to permit you better to overcome the present difficulties of the Church in Holland?"
'DEBATE CLOSED'
A spokesman for the council said after the meeting that the bishops were expected to outline a new policy on celibacy before it meets in April for its sixth session. The council, the only one of its kind in the world, was set up after the Vatican Council to give policy guidance to the episcopate.
A Vatican Press officer stressed last week that the council was "only a consultative body" and that its action had no juridical effect.
After the vote, a group of
Dutch priests known as the Septuagint Group announced that they considered it had "closed the debate on celibacy." They said that pending the bishops' decision they were seeking parishes ready to accept married priests, and already had acceptance from five.
A vehement protest was made last week by a group of conservative Dutch Catholics called the Michael Legion against a reported statement by Cardinal Alfrink that the Pastoral Council represented all the Catholics of Holland.
In a telegram to the Pope the group said that the Dutch bishops were ultimately responsible for the council's recommendations. These recorn• mendations were "making many faithful Catholics lose confidence in their bishops completely."
London lecture on non-violence
'ERA SANDTERL, COI founder with folk singer Joan Baez of an institute for the study of non-violence in California, starts a five-month lecture tour of Europe on Monday when he talks an his experiences to the London School of Non-Violence in the crypt of St. Martin-in-the
Fields.