Asked why there was so much disunity on the question of pro-choice Catholics receiving Communion, Denver’s Archbishop Charles J. Chaput told the audience at the University of Notre Dame on April 8: “The reason...is that there is no unity among the bishops about it.” He said, “There is unity among the bishops about abortion always being wrong and that you can’t be a Catholic and be in favor of abortion…but there’s just an inability among the bishops together to speak clearly on this matter and even to say that it you’re Catholic and you’re pro-choice, you can’t receive holy Communion.” There is a fear, he said, that if bishops speak clearly on the issue, they would make it difficult for Catholic politicians to be elected and would disenfranchise the Catholic community. The strategy clearly has failed, he said. “So let’s try something different and see if it works. Let’s be very, very clear on these matters.”
Bishops Divided on Pro-Choice Politicians
Show Comments (
)
Comments are automatically closed two weeks after an article's initial publication. See our comments policy for more.
The latest from america
“Let diplomacy silence the guns!” Pope Leo XIV told the crowd in St. Peter’s Square a few hours after the United States entered the Iran-Israel war by bombing three of Iran’s nuclear sites.
Pope Leo XIV’s statement was read at the premiere of a play about the Peruvian investigative journalist Paola Ugaz, who was subject to death threats because of her reporting on sexual abuse.
About a dozen religious leaders from the San Diego area, including Bishop Michael Pham, visited federal immigration court on Friday “to provide some sense of presence.”
In a time of increasing disaffiliation from and disillusionment with the institutional church, a new theological perspective on the church is needed—one that places Jesus’ own teaching at the center.