Pope Francis says bishops should be pastors, not politicians in US debate over refusing Biden’s communion on abortion

by



[ad_1]

“The problem is not theological, it is pastoral,” Francis told reporters on a trip from Slovakia to Rome on Wednesday. “How we bishops deal with this principle. We are to be pastors, also with those who are excommunicated. Like God with passion and tenderness. The Bible says so.”

His comments come amid a smoldering debate within the American Catholic Church over granting communion to Catholic politicians who support the right to abortion, including the country’s second Catholic president. Biden had been denied the sacrament in the run-up to the election and the issue gained new attention in June when the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops implemented a plan that could deny Communion to such public figures. , setting up a potential public reprimand from The President.

By 168 votes to 55, with six abstentions, the bishops had put forward the project of a report on the meaning of the Eucharist in the Church. The vote is part of a longer process, and the Vatican is expected to approve any action on behalf of the bishops.

Catholics for Choice, a liberal Catholic group that defends the right to abortion, said at the time it was “deeply saddened” by the vote and condemned the use of the Eucharist “as a weapon of punishment” .

“In a country and a church already torn by tension and division, bishops today have chosen to be partisan rather than pastoral, cruel rather than Christian,” the group said. “They chose to disobey Jesus’ command to ‘feed one another’, but ordinary American Catholics – 67% of whom oppose Communion and other sacraments being denied to supporters of the right to life. ‘abortion – will continue to know better and do better. “

An abortion rights advocate and the first Catholic President of the United States for nearly 60 years, Biden displays a devotion to regular church services that recent presidents miss, who claim to be Christians, but intermittently go to the church. church or worshiped privately during their tenure.

He married his late first wife, Neilia, in a Catholic church, attends weekly mass, and sprinkles his political speech with quotes from Scripture, Catholic hymns, and references to the nuns and priests from whom he learned to teach. school.

Pew polls show that more than half of American Catholics support the right to abortion and most American Catholics don’t think Biden should be denied Communion.

“The pastor knows what to do. Every moment he leaves the pastoral path of the church, he immediately becomes a politician,” Francis said Wednesday.

[ad_2]

Source link