Romania Training Documentary

Description: Exploring the socio-religious roots of celibacy around the globe, CELIBACY provides new insights into the current controversy, featuring interviews with current and former celibates of the Catholic, Buddhist and Hindu faiths, as well as historians, scientists, psychologists and others. The timely America Undercover documentary is directed by Antony Thomas who also directed HBO's A QUESTION OF MIRACLES. "The Crisis," as the Catholic Church refers to the wide-ranging scandal, invites many questions. Given that the sex drive is the most powerful human urge, is sexual denial healthy? Why is celibacy compulsory for the clergy in Catholicism? What is the effect on those who choose to accept it in the name of religion? Filmed in ten countries, CELIBACY examines sexual abstinence in major eastern religions, as well as the Catholic Church. Buddhists and Hindus revere and often urge celibacy, especially among nuns and monks, but it is not enforced. The documentary visits a Buddhist convent in Tibet, where the "de-feminization" of a young girl takes place during an initiation rite; a wrestling gymnasium for young Hindu men, where the sex drive is meant to be sublimated, redirected and transformed into bodily strength and energy; and one of 200 Eastern Orthodox convents in Romania, where young women take part in a ritual marriage to Jesus Christ, renouncing sex for the remainder of their lives and making Jesus the recipient of all their passion and love. The Roman Catholic Church has taken the tradition of renouncing all sexual acts, including thoughts and desires, to its most extreme form. Celibacy became mandatory for the Church clergy in 1139, but its enforcement has never really been effective. With the recent revelations of sexual abuse cases in at least ten countries, including the U.S., and virtually every state, the requirement that clergy must be celibate for life is being challenged. Legal settlements are now estimated at more than one billion dollars, and the crisis has contributed to ongoing widespread defections among priests and nuns, as well as taking an immeasurable toll on thousands of the faithful. Some 200,000 priests have renounced their vows since 1960, and the intake of new priests is shrinking dramatically.