Gareth O'Callaghan: Priests are having affairs — is it really such a shocking fact?

I have never seen any sense in the vow of celibacy. It has always struck me as biologically and emotionally unnatural. So why won’t the Catholic Church allow its priests to marry?

'I watched a priest refuse Communion to a woman standing at the altar recently because she had left her alcoholic husband, and found love with another man, one who was decent and kind to her. Sadly, the church is still riddled with this blinkered hypocrisy.'

I’ve just been shown a beautiful family photo of a man and woman, and their two young children aged six and seven. 

Tom, a friend whom I haven’t seen for years, is the children’s stepdad — their beau pere, as he calls it, even though the couple aren’t married. Tom met Mairéad five years ago.