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MEDIA ADVISORY, July 17 /Christian Newswire/ -- ChristiaNet.com, the world's largest Christian portal with twelve million monthly page loads, asked readers to participate in a new poll by answering the question, "Should Priests be allowed to marry?" President of ChristiaNet.com, Bill Cooper, says "Marriage between man and woman is something God created in the Garden of Eden. To deny someone the opportunity to marry is unbiblical."

80% of the 1,135 voters said "Yes" to the question of married clergymen. Top reasons for the affirmative vote included comments such as "Priests of the Old Testament were married" and "God created the institution of marriage". Other comments related specifically to Scripture verses like Paul's advice to Timothy calling the forbidding of marriage a "doctrine of devils". (1 Timothy 4:1-3) While others equated the position of priest with that of pastor, bishop or deacon, allowing the man to be the "husband of one wife".

The group that felt Priests should not marry comprised about 10% of the participants. Top comments included "He took a vow before God", "He can dedicate 100% of his time to serving God" and "It's a requirement of the position". Many in this group believed families are a distraction from serving God. Yet if this is true, it seems that every believer in God should be unmarried since all believers are called to serve.

The remaining ten percent of the voters chose "Unsure". Half of the participants in this group felt that the decision is between the Priest and God, but felt it is okay for them to marry. While the other half were truly unsure because they did not know enough about why someone would take a vow of celibacy or a church would require it.

In the final analysis, the comments from the two main groups created a distinct difference in how they answered questions relating to their faith. Whereas the "Yes" group responded from a Biblical perspective with comments like "The Bible states this". While the "No" respondents tended to lean on traditions of the church saying "It's the rules of the church" or "Priests are married to the church". As Christians, whenever a question arises about principles or doctrines, we should test all things against what God has said in the Bible before making our decision.

To educate Christians on marriage, ChristiaNet just released some Free Marriage Tracts. ChristiaNet has made it simple to share these informative ecards with others.