Program of Priestly Formation (Ascension)

PPF 212

Program of Priestly Formation

To live fully an effective life of celibate chastity, in imitation of Christ’s sacrificial love, requires knowledge of one’s own sexuality and rightly ordered sexual desires. 264 Certain habits or skills are necessary instruments on the path to healthy celibate chastity, and these are to be encouraged in seminary programs. Among these habits and skills are appropriate self-disclosure, a cultivated capacity for self reflection, an ability to enter into peaceful solitude, ascetical practices that foster vigilance and self-mastery over one’s impulses and drives, and a habit of modesty. An especially important practice is holding all persons in the mystery of God, whether they are encountered in the course of formal ministry or ordinary life. This practice means viewing all persons in God, interceding for them before God, and claiming responsibility to direct them to God. A seminary human formation program should inculcate additional skills for celibate living as care for others, a deepening of the capacity to give and receive love, an ability to practice appropriate self disclosure, an ability to develop and maintain healthy and inclusive peer friendships, and an ability to set appropriate boundaries by choosing not to act on romantic feelings and by developing self discipline in the face of temptation. A seminarian must be prepared to accept wholeheartedly the Church’s teaching on sexuality in its entirety, be determined to master all sexual temptations, be prepared to meet the challenge of living chastely in all friendships, and finally be resolved to fashion his sexual desires and passions in such a way that he is able to live a healthy, celibate lifestyle that expresses self gift in faithful and life-giving love: being attentive to others, helping them reach their potential, not giving up, and investing all one’s energies in the service of the Kingdom of God. Given the pervasive reality of pornography in today’s culture, each program is to address

212

213

264 A rightly ordered sexual desire is ordered toward a monogamous, exclusive marriage between a man and woman for the procreation of children.

108