Posted on 10/04/2005 1:14:14 PM PDT by NYer
The senior American at the Vatican has urged a meeting of the world's bishops to discuss whether Catholic politicians who support abortion rights should receive communion, saying the issue had divided many in the U.S. church.
Archbishop William Levada, who heads the Vatican's Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, made the appeal during a debate late Monday at the synod of bishops, the Oct. 2-23 meeting of bishops discussing major issues facing the Church.
Levada also asked to hear the experiences of other church leaders on the topic, according to the Rev. John Bartunek, briefing reporters on developments in the closed-door meeting.
"This issue has caused some divisions among the people in the church" during the 2004 presidential election, the briefer quoted Levada as saying. During the campaign, St. Louis Archbishop Raymond Burke said he would deny Communion to Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry, a Catholic who supports abortion rights.
The working document for the synod said it was a sin for the faithful to support Catholic politicians who themselves back abortion and other policies contrary to church teaching.
"Some receive Communion while denying the teachings of the church or publicly supporting immoral choices in life, such as abortion, without thinking that they are committing an act of grave personal dishonesty and causing scandal," the document said.
"Some Catholics do not understand why it might be a sin to support a political candidate who is openly in favor of abortion or other serious acts against life, justice and peace."
The briefer said the issue of the shortage of priests came up, but made no mention of suggestions of addressing it by allowing married men into the priesthood or ordaining women as deacons.
Honduran Bishop Roberto Camilleri Azzopardi said the key was a better distribution of priests in the world. He noted that in his diocese there was one priest for every 16,000 Catholics.
While Pope Benedict XVI listened in the Vatican's synod hall where the meetings are taking place, across the River Tiber, members the European-based We Are Church and the American FutureChurch reform groups outlined their hopes for the synod.
"We would like the bishops to have more liberty to decide for themselves, according to the requirements and demands of their specific regions," said German theology professor Dr. Norbert Scholl.
Referring to the synod whose specific topic is the Eucharist, the groups said their main concerns were the shortage of priests and the problem of sharing Communion with other Christian denominations.
"`When members of the same family cannot sit down and eat together, the family is in trouble," said Austrian psychologist Martha Heizer.
An American nun, Sister Christine Schenk from FutureChurch, noted that parishes in the United States are being affected by the shortage of priests. Along with allowing non-celibate men into the priesthood, she suggested women deacons. "There are a lot of available and willing women out there," she said at a news conference Tuesday.
The groups expressed the hope that Benedict could make changes.
"He knows the rules of the game," said Heizer, pointing to the pope's 24 years of experience as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith before his election to the papacy in April.
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!
Because the Episcopagans have already been destroyed. Catholicism has not. Make no mistake, that is their sole intent. Destroy Catholicism and remake it in their modernistic pagan mold.
Ain't that the truth!
NYer: Just in case, no one else had said so lately, is it OK for me to thank you for all of the tremendous volume of work that you put in here on this subject and so many others? God bless you and yours.
Thanks, but my light is quite dim by comparison to yours. It's freepers like you, Salvation and many others who are a source of daily inspiration. Through you I have learned much and grown stronger in faith and understanding. May God bless you and yours!
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