Catechesis: Clerical Celibacy

For no one will ever be able to change or arrange these matters better or more wisely than God Himself, who instituted marriage to help human frailty and to prevent sexual immorality… How can the marriage of priests and clergy, especially of pastors and others who are to serve the church, be disadvantageous to the Christian Church as a whole? There may well be a shortage of priests and pastors in the future if this harsh prohibition of marriage should last much longer.—AC XXIII:14, 15, 17