No one really knows. A married priests' organization, Corpus , estimates that 23,000 U.S. men have left the Catholic priesthood in the last thirty years, most of them marrying. A conservative Catholic organization, Human Life International , disputes the figures, saying that the actual total of resigned priests is closer to 6,000.
Many married priests continue as clergymen in the private sector.
The priest in Ruiville had fathered a child with the wife of a stonecarver and was said to have many other children as well. The account continues . One smiles to read that Ralph, priest of Essources, is gravely ill-famed of incontinence. Chaucer is not the only Catholic to have been at once fascinated and appalled by clerical sexual lapses. If comedy is merely tragedy disguised, a more somber reaction to priestly misdeeds inevitably accompanies the Chaucerian laughter.