Posted on 04/11/2004 9:13:49 PM PDT by Coleus
OSTON, April 11 — Rejecting the admonitions of several national Roman Catholic leaders, Senator John Kerry received communion at Easter services today at the Paulist Center here, a kind of New Age church that describes itself as "a worship community of Christians in the Roman Catholic tradition" and that attracts people drawn to its dedication to "family religious education and social justice."
Mr. Kerry's decision to receive communion represented a challenge to several prominent Catholic bishops, who have become increasingly exasperated with politicians who are Catholic but who deviate from Catholic teaching.
Mr. Kerry, the presumed Democratic presidential nominee, supports abortion rights and stem cell research, both of which are contrary to church teaching. He and his wife, Teresa Heinz Kerry, are regular worshipers at the Paulist Center, which is near their home on Beacon Hill.
Last November, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops organized a task force headed by Cardinal Theodore McCarrick of Washington to study how the church should treat Catholic politicians like Mr. Kerry, who say they are personally opposed to abortion, for example, but support abortion rights legislatively. There has been a long line of such politicians, including Mario Cuomo, the former governor of New York, and Geraldine Ferraro, the Democratic vice presidential candidate in 1984.
The task force has not issued any specific recommendations, but some members have discussed a range of penalties, from withholding communion to excommunication.
In a television interview today, Cardinal McCarrick indicated that depriving a Catholic of communion would be a last resort that he, for one, would be reluctant to take.
"I think there are many of us who would feel that there are certain restrictions that we might put on people" he said on the "Fox News Sunday" program. "But I think many of us would not like to use the Eucharist as part of the sanctions."
In February, the archbishop of St. Louis, Raymond Burke, warned Mr. Kerry before the Missouri primary that he would not give him communion because the senator was defying church teaching.
Archbishop Sean O'Malley of Boston has not explicitly said that Mr. Kerry may not receive communion, but he has suggested that Catholic politicians whose political views contradict Catholic teaching should voluntarily abstain, saying they "shouldn't dare come to communion."
There were no protesters at today's services, and it was not clear whether Mr. Kerry's receiving communion would bring a response from the church or affect his campaign as he seeks to become only the second Roman Catholic president of the United States, after John F. Kennedy.
"It was a wonderful service," Mr. Kerry told reporters afterward. As he emerged from the church, he received a sustained ovation. He shook hands with several people and posed for pictures, then ducked back into the vestibule to thank the priest.
Mr. Kerry heads to New Hampshire on Monday and expects to have several Democratic colleagues around the country join in a coordinated attack on President Bush's handling of the economy.
In an ongoing effort to make the economy the central issue in the presidential campaign, Mr. Kerry's campaign issued a so-called "misery index" today that purports to show that under Mr. Bush, the economic power of middle-class families has deteriorated at record levels.
The misery index is based on median family income, private-sector job growth, the rate of home ownership, the increase in the number of personal bankruptcies and the cost of college tuition, health care and gasoline cost.
The Kerry campaign has computed that the "misery index" in the last three years under Mr. Bush has been the worst in in three decades, with the biggest problems being the rise in college tuition (up 13 percent from 2002 to 2003), the loss of private-sector jobs, the rise in health premiums and the decline in family income.
Annulments are NOT hard to get. They take time, but over 50,000 annulments were granted in the US last year.
And, I've read reliable accounts that Kerry DID, in fact, get an annulment from his first wife.
Money is not a determining factor in who gets an annulment. It never has been.
Sadly, this isn't the case. Now adays the Church (at least in the U.S.) pretty much assumes the both spouses are crossing their fingers when they say "I do"
Which, I suppose, would also explain the Church's condemnation of capital punishment. Yet nobody is talking about denying the sacraments to a politician who supports that.
And divorce is specifically condemned in Christ's own words in Matthew and Mark, and those like Kerry (or Gingrich and Reagan for that matter) who divorce and remarry are living adulterous lives. Yet we don't condemn those who support divorce. In fact we cheer them on as they make divorce easier and provide tax incentives for those who destroy their families. So by all means deny those who support abortion rights access to Communion, I don't have a problem with that. But advocate the same for those who support other positions that are contrary to church dogma, like capital punishment and divorce. It's only right, wouldn't you agree?
Anti-capital punishment is not a dogma of the Catholic Church. Never was. Never will be.
Has anyone told the Pope that?
Obviously. Or else he'd raise it to that level. As he is very much against capital punishment.
Dennis, I worked in a marriage tribunal role for ten years, ending in 1996.
You are simply wrong, not only about the "annulments outside those parameters," but also about money being needed to obtain such an annulment.
Psychological grounds form the basis for 99% of all anulments granted today, with "inability to form a sacramental union" being the most predominant.
Actually, that is this particular pope and from what I've read of it he condemns it only circumstantially to exclude places where it cannot be guaranteed that the offender will not be released. It is also the case that the majority of popes before him have not condemned it similarly. Abortion, on the other hand, has been consistently denounced by the church's theologians since roughly the first or second centuries.
And divorce is specifically condemned in Christ's own words in Matthew and Mark, and those like Kerry (or Gingrich and Reagan for that matter) who divorce and remarry are living adulterous lives.
The traditional way "out" of this in catholic circles is an annulment, which can legitimately occur under several circumstances, among them certain cases where adultery has already happened.
Yet we don't condemn those who support divorce.
You may not. Others, including most catholics, tend to believe that divorce procedures have become far too lax and should require some form of cause to be stated.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.