Litmus Test: Trial by Priest

You know how sometimes it's difficult to know what you really think about something? For instance, sometimes I'll tell my Beloved what our options are for dinner, but once he picks one of them I realize that that wasn't what I wanted. (If you're wondering whether or not this is annoying to my partner-in-crime, the answer is a resounding YES!). Or if someone asks you if killing is wrong, you say "yes," but then they follow it up with "but what if you could save 5 million other lives by killing someone" and you have to rethink your position.

Well, I think I've developed a new ethical litmus test for moral questions. Ask yourself the following question: Would it seem strange to you if a priest did it while wearing a collar?

Several weeks ago, I was watching part of a poker tournament on TV (Don't judge...as I've said, we really don't have that many channels.) And one of the players was a Catholic priest. Wearing a collar. Right there playing poker. On television. And I was completely stupefied. He just shouldn't be doing that! I thought. It's totally inappropriate! What does he think he's doing?
Mr. Love-it-or-leav-itt, always the realist, asked, "What's the problem? Do you think playing poker is morally wrong?"
"Well, of COURSE not," I said. "I just don't think a PRIEST should be doing it in his COLLAR on TELEVISION." (I always speak in all capital letters when I am defending myself against the usually rational always sensible stylings of THE HUSBAND.) But I had to ask myself, if I didn't think it was wrong, why couldn't a priest do it? Even believing clergy need to hold themselves to a higher moral standard in public would indicate that I thought the highest moral ideal was NOT to be playing poker on television. So I decided to apply this to a few other situations: Should a priest in a clerical collar smoke cigarettes? Probably not. Hmmmm.....I didn't think I had a problem with smoking. Should he have a cocktail? Weeeelllllll.....maybe not with the collar. (Woah! I thought. Who was this morally conservative person I was actually turning out to be?) Let's keep going. Should a priest in a collar bet on horse races? Definitely not. Go to a sketchy night club and grind the night away on some cute babes? No WAY! Don't get me wrong...some of this stuff is stupid or unhealthy, but I didn't think I thought it was morally wrong. But something must be wrong if I thought a priest couldn't do it. I tried applying it to situations I knew I already thought were okay: Gay priest in a collar? Fine. Priest in a polling place voting? No problem. Priest on a date? Seems fine to me.

Now I know there are a lot of things going on here: the distinction between the person and the role, the public versus the private life of clergy, but I still believe there's something interesting here, a type of priestly ethical test. There are certainly things in my own life as a pastor that I would not want my congregation to see me doing in my collar. But why not? Do I believe, deep down, that they are wrong? Or am I just making a healthy distinction between personality and profession? I'm not sure yet, but it's definitely something to think on. And a rather fun imagination game for commercial breaks during the poker tournament!