With all due respect to Pope Francis, he appears to be “leading” the Church from the rear.
Are the misguided Catholic Bishops concerned about losing collection plate revenues as a consequence of obeying Jesus’ zero-tolerance teaching about not fellowshipping with unrepentant sinners?
Matthew 18:15-17 shows that Jesus taught (paraphrased) that a congregation is to ultimately tell unrepentant sinners not to let the door hit them on their way out of the church.
In fact, not only does 1 Corinthians 5 show us that Paul reprimanded the church at Corinth for tolerating fellowship with a sexual offender (things evidently haven’t changed after 2000 years), but 1 Corinthians 5:11 tells Christians not even to eat with such people.
I certainly don’t agree with the middle-of-the-road approach the RCC is apparently starting down on this, but, I wonder, if someone is engaging in adultery, fornication, etcetera, should any church tell them that they can never come back to church and attend service(s) to listen to the message even if they have not repented?