Clerical marriage is the practice of allowing clergy to marry. Clerical marriage is admitted in Protestantism, Judaism, Anglicanism, Independent Catholic Churches, and the Japanese sects of Buddhism. The Roman Catholic Church, while allowing married men to be ordained (only exceptionally in its Western form but more commonly in the Eastern Catholic Churches), also excludes clerical marriage. Churches such as the Eastern Orthodox and the Oriental Orthodox exclude this practice for their priests, while accepting already married men for ordination to priesthood.
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