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I know a handful of celibate protestants

So do I, but their churches tend to neglect giving them a role that clarifies that they _actively chose_ celibacy, and didn't just get left on the shelf when the marriages were getting handed out.

I think it is important to ground the discussion in what Scripture actually requires. Celibacy is never commanded as a mandate for any office in the church. Elders, overseers, and deacons are consistently described as husbands of one wife, managing their households well. Singleness is honoured as a gift, but Scripture treats it as a personal calling, not a qualification. Paul presents celibacy as optional and explicitly tied to individual circumstance and conviction, not institutional expectation. The moment we start adding requirements or social pressure for celibacy, we drift toward imposing burdens Scripture never places on people. If someone chooses singleness for the sake of ministry, that is admirable. If someone pursues marriage, that is also honourable. Both are valid biblical vocations. The church should make room for both without implying that one is spiritually superior or that individuals must “signal” their choice through a formal role.

Mary Magdalene. Jesus might as well have been married. And he might've been - a lack of evidence is not evidence of lack. The evidence we have is gnostic gospels and Jewish tradition, in which he would've been married around the same time as the tradition now called bar mitzvah. Circumstantial, maybe spurious, but not nothing, and the not-nothing-but-not-much evidence tilts on the side of : he was married.