[Tax-chick]

the church can be welcoming of gay people who are legally married

And open adulterers and fornicators, too, right? How about open racists? Thieves and perjurers?

Where does the "welcoming" of open and unrepentant sinners end?

[Mrs. Don-o]

I could wring Cardinal Wuerl's neck, except I'm pretty sure that would be a canonical delict.

He's correct when he says the Church allows ---in the door (sort of)--- people who are divorced-remarried, even though they are no more "married" in the eyes of God than two sexually disordered men. So the comparison was technically correct.

But then he turns the analogy in exactly the wrong direction when he says,

"-- and it has never been a great problem."

EXCUSE ME??? I am working RIGHT NOW with the long-term emotional heartache and grief of two divorced-remarried couples, RCIA students of mine who completed the whole course but could not receive any of the Easter Sacraments because their petitions of annulment have not gone through.

Mind you, I know the Church is right about this, because the Church DOES take marriage seriously. But it IS a great problem. a HUGE problem. It's not like they just have a paperwork glitch. Their whole life in the Church has been knocked clear off the track because they are living in --- well, adultery , to use the word used by Jesus Christ when He explicitly forbade divorce-remarriage.

Mind you, there may be findings of nullity in these cases, and things will begin to resolve and be hunky-dory. But there may not. And if the Church upholds the bond, these people are going to be out of the Sacraments until the former spouse dies, or the present spouse dies, or they decide to live together in sexual continence, or the Second Coming of Jesus Christ, whichever comes first.

It's hard. It's a BIG PROBLEM.

It fries my grits when "gay married couples" are given the equivalent of a lavender-love sparkle-sticker, while divorced/remarried heteros get the Scarlet Letter.

Again, the Church is right to uphold the sanctity of marriage in every case, and to insist on "Real Marriage, No Substitutes."

But Cardinal Wuerl makes it would like a footnote formatting error. "Never been a great problem," my asterisk.

Grrrr.

Alleluia.

[SuziQ]

Churches SHOULD be welcoming to sinners. How else would any of us be welcome there? Granted we may not be BIG sinners, but sin is sin, and we're all in need of God's Grace to overcome it. If sinners aren't there, where else will they hear God's Word?

The problem comes when Churches start to mitigate their message so as not to offend those sinners. The Episcopal Church and some of the Methodist and Lutheran churches have done this, to their detriment. If the Church doesn't change the message, I don't see the problem with inviting those who are public sinners to be there to hear it.

[ApplegateRanch]

And open adulterers and fornicators, too, right? How about open racists? Thieves and perjurers?

Where does the “welcoming” of open and unrepentant sinners end?

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A little east of Kennedy-sized bank accounts; and a bit west of Pelosi-sized political power.