Posted on 02/27/2017 3:45:40 PM PST by ebb tide
Pope Francis urged parish priests participating in a Vatican-run course titled the “New Marriage Procedure” to “welcome” cohabitating couples living in fornication who “prefer to live together without getting married.” The pope did not ask priests to admonish such couples for living in grave sin nor did he ask them to work for their conversion and repentance.
“At the same time, make yourselves close with the style of the Gospel itself, in the encounter and welcome of those young people that prefer living together without getting married,” he told priests at the Saturday, February 25 event organized by the Roma Rota, the Vatican’s highest ecclesiastical court.
“On the spiritual and moral plane, they are among the poor and the little ones, toward whom the Church, following in the footsteps of her Teacher and Lord, wants to be a Mother that does not abandon but comes close and takes care. These persons are also loved by Christ’s heart. This care of the last, precisely because it emanates from the Gospel, is an essential part of your work of promotion and defense of the Sacrament of Marriage,” he added.
Last year Francis said that cohabitating couples are in a “real marriage” and receive the grace of the Sacrament. “I’ve seen a lot of fidelity in these cohabitations, and I am sure that this is a real marriage, they have the grace of a real marriage because of their fidelity,” he said at that time.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church calls fornication “gravely contrary to the dignity of persons and of human sexuality which is naturally ordered to the good of spouses and the generation and education of children.”
It further states that situations such as cohabitation “offend against the dignity of marriage; they destroy the very idea of the family; they weaken the sense of fidelity. They are contrary to the moral law. The sexual act must take place exclusively within marriage. Outside of marriage it always constitutes a grave sin and excludes one from sacramental communion.”
The formative course was designed to teach parish priests working in their own respective diocesan courts on marriage annulments, and other related matters, how to implement the changes of the two Motu Proprio, Mitis Iudex and Misericors Jesus, with Amoris Laetitia giving the larger framework.
Francis told the priests that for “every person and every situation you are called to be fellow travelers to witness and support.”
He urged them to “support” all couples who have determined by themselves that their marriage is invalid and want it officially declared as such.
“When you offer this witness, may your care be also to support all those who have realized the fact that their union is not a true sacramental marriage and want to come out of this situation. In this delicate and necessary work, proceed in such a way that your faithful recognize you not so much as experts of bureaucratic acts or juridical norms, but as brothers who put themselves in an attitude of listening and of understanding,” he said.
Francis stated that priests are often the first representative of the Church to whom young people encounter when they get married and at the same time the first to whom they turn when their marriage is in crisis.
“It is you to whom the spouses turn, when serious problems in their relation occur and they find themselves in crisis and have the need to revamp the faith and rediscover the grace of the sacrament; and in some cases ask indications to begin a process of annulment.”
The process of discernment he left in the hands of the individual in their parish since “nobody better than you knows and is in contact with the reality of the social grid of that territory, and experiences the various complexities.”
I did answer; did you not understand the answer ?
Not on catholic caucus threads.
Yes or No? Do agree with the heretic Bergoglio?
Please clarify how the same quote says something different in your article.
Actually, I do not have a problem with this. He is calling on them to witness to them regarding the sacrament. Do you support the sinner who has determined that their sin is in grave danger and answers the call to forgiveness? I sure hope to hell you do!!!
Full context requoted:
Francis told the priests that for “every person and every situation you are called to be fellow travelers to witness and support.”
He urged them to “support” all couples who have determined by themselves that their marriage is invalid and want it officially declared as such.
“When you offer this witness, may your care be also to support all those who have realized the fact that their union is not a true sacramental marriage and want to come out of this situation. In this delicate and necessary work, proceed in such a way that your faithful recognize you not so much as experts of bureaucratic acts or juridical norms, but as brothers who put themselves in an attitude of listening and of understanding,” he said.
Isn't Lifesite News a Catholic website? Are the Catholic websites now being accused of fake news/propaganda about Francis?
The article you linked to sure does present it quite differently!
There is no sacrament or sacramental grace in cohabitation, i.e. fortification.
You don’t appear to be Catholic. You have been proven wrong in saying the posted article is fake news yet you won’t admit it. You have twice falsely implied I’m SSPX (bearing case witness) and you quote protestant bibles.
fornification
Is is Catholic to call the Pope by his last name instead respectfully using his given title as the elected Pope of the Catholic Church, Pope Francis ?
Do you call him Pope Francis ?
It is cognitive dissonance on a Catholic Caucus thread to argue that Pope Francis is not the successor of Pope Benedict XVI. Are you asserting neither of them are Catholic Popes ?
Where I have mentioned Pope Benedict XVI?
Are you making up stuff again?
Nothing was twisted, except maybe your posts and false accusations. Where have I identified with the SSPX?
The lifesite article was biased and twisted Pope Francis’ words out of context. I’m still awaiting your answer on a Catholic Caucus thread as to whether you recognize Pope Benedict XVI as a Catholic Pope and Pope Francis as a Catholic Pope. It’s a simple pair of questions.
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