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PaperclipPerfector  3d ago (text post)   1714 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for May 4, 2025

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Are their any non-religious organizations whose members take vows oaths of celibacy, a la the Night's Watch or the Maesters from ASOIAF?

(I'm pretty sure the answer is "no," but I'd like to double-check my bases so I can be more certain in replying as such the next time someone "advises" me to "go join the Night's Watch" or similar.)

(Edited per @FiveHourMarathon's fine pedantry.)

Not that it answers your question, but technically the Night's Watch doesn't take a vow of celibacy. They promise to take no wife and father no children, not to abstain from sex.

Celibacy is no marriage, chastity is no sex. Don't worry even Catholics get it wrong a lot (and rise of the incorrect term Incel has furthered that misunderstanding)

Sure, but the relevant canon regarding celibacy actually says ‘clerics in the Roman rite are obliged to perfect and perpetual continence’- it doesn’t use either word.

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