23. _Marriage of Bishops._--I should feel obliged to any of your
correspondents who would supply me with an example from early Church
history of a bishop or priest marrying after ordination.
Deacons were expressly allowed to marry by the Council of Ancyra; but I
should wish an example of either of the others.
Marriage after priestly ordination is now forbidden by the Greek church,
and since the Council of Trullo bishops must be celibate or continent.
Second Query--What evidence is there that bishops in early times, if
already married, were obliged to put away their wives? It is said that
St. Gregory Nazianzen's father had children after he was raised to the
episcopate. Can this be proved, and are there other instances?
From the silence of early Church writers as to any difference between
the clergy and laity on this point, I am much inclined to believe that
the Roman requirement of celibacy was then confined to the bishopric of
Rome itself, and the immediately adjoining country.
St. Paul, in 1 Cor. ix.5., says:
"Have we not power to lead about a sister, a wife, as well as the
other apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord and Cephas?"
implying that he had power to marry even then; and our Saviour speaks of
continence as a gift given only to certain persons. (St. Matthew, chap.
xix. ver. 11, 12.)