Depressed by his wife's infertility, Ashok adopts the advice of a spiritual guru and embraces celibacy.
Taken in its strictest definition, there is a question mark over whether celibacy is possible.
However, they are less and less willing either to hide or to lead lives of celibacy.
Dubious veterinary thinkers spread a theory that dogs could acquire rabies spontaneously as a result of forced celibacy.
Some blame clerical celibacy for the rash of paedophilia cases that have rocked the church in recent years.
Although celibacy was an obvious obstacle to growth, the Shakers kept attracting new members into the present century.
Although many clergy admit privately that celibacy has to be reassessed, it is not on any official agenda.
There are also tensions between traditionalists and reformers over issues including priestly celibacy, gay rights and the role of women.
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Celibacy was instituted only in 1139, a millennium into the church's existence.
Yet they are winning, says Kristi Hayes, a Washington-based spokeswoman for the Abstinence Clearinghouse, a group that advocates celibacy until marriage and fidelity thereafter.
For better or worse, American women have not been able to agree among themselves which 8 million of them should be consigned to permanent celibacy.
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Catholic priests are all men and while there are celibate women - typically nuns - much of the debate tends to focus on male celibacy.
Some priests are now living in open rebellion with church teaching, calling for a rethink on everything from homosexuality to women's ordination to priestly celibacy.
The celibacy rule is simply that a rule, rather than incontrovertible doctrine.
Pressure for the Pope to resign has come from liberal Catholics hoping that a successor might relax Church views on contraception, abortion, women's ordination and celibacy.
Here lies President Jacob Zuma, he danced his way into the presidency and built the biggest monastery in South Africa where he lived a life of celibacy.
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Celibacy, which gets less attention, is an even deeper problem.
Cardinal Martini says the Church must face up to the problems of modern life, including such issues as sexuality, divorce, the celibacy of the priesthood, and the role of women in the Church.
The scandals of paedophile priests and priests with lovers and children has raised questions over just how practical celibacy is (though of course it is not celibacy in itself that makes men paedophiles).
It stars a Latin American pope who understands real life and is liberal on issues like clerical celibacy, women priests and the pursuit of social justice, but who wants to keep his church intact.
Where the pope may run into difficulty is with the substantial number of liberal Catholics who long to see the Vatican take a more liberal line on matters such as contraception and priestly celibacy.
Had the church abandoned priestly celibacy as trendy Western opinion now demands, or dispensed with loyalty to the pope as Beijing wishes, those Japanese believers never would have recognized the "same-heartedness" of a surprised French priest.
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But, if a relaxation of the celibacy rule seems improbable, the chances of a female priesthood appear all but impossible, both because it is a matter of doctrine, and because of much more widespread opposition among the faithful.
Mention Shakers and most people think of the simple dignity of their furniture and architecture, or perhaps their music, or the rigour of their communal lives, which demands celibacy, simplicity, hard work and a common sharing of goods.
Prior to being elevated to a cardinal by Pope John Paul II on 21 October 2003, when he became only the third Scot to reach the rank since the Reformation, he had expressed his openness to a debate on issues like priestly celibacy, women priests and contraception within the church.
Despite reeling from a variety of sex scandals, the Catholic church under its arch-conservative pope is staunchly maintaining its opposition to homosexuality among the congregation, let alone the clergy even though in reality the priesthood has for centuries attracted many gay men, not all of whom kept to their vows of celibacy.
He insisted, like an American teenager who's signed the "True Love Waits" vow of celibacy until their wedding day, that we must be patient, stop fumbling and hold on for the manifesto, while fluttering his eyelids so that we all know that he's been round the back of the bike shed with the Guardian, and it's all true.
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