Papal exhortation avoids clear statement on Communion

[pnewton]

The objective situation is like a model, so one can only see if the circumstances fit the model. So, a couple in a D&R situation would objectively be in a state of mortal sin.

The problem with your question here is that we only have a partial knowledge of what God is thinking, so we must look at what God taught.

If the question cannot be answered, based on partial knowledge, then why not let a priest through a process of counselling answer it? He may come to the understanding from this process that the only valid marriage is the “remarriage.” So for this problem, the questions of “a coulpe in a D & R situation”, is the question that must first be answered. Are they really in a remarriage.

I see several issues coming from this letter, or that will arise. The above is the easiest. to answer. Marriage is not a Sacrament of the Church. It is the one Sacrament that existed from the beginning. This is what the annulment process discerns nullity, it does not provide nullity.

In other words, sometimes what seems to be divorce and remarriage is not actually divorce and remarriage.

The second are harder question will be when there is in fact a remarriage, but it was done without culpability.

The third situation would be where there is remarriage, with full culpability, and then repentence.

 

[OraLabora]

I don’t think my using the language of the Church for 1950+ years is something that needs to be fixed.

But more to the point it is not the language she currently uses.

 

[roseofshannon]

I simply don’t understand why so many are so hard of heart and so intransigent on a little mercy being shown in a few rare cases where it may be beneficial to someone’s salvation to do so? People aren’t machines with an on/off switch.

I think it’s probably more helpful if we all stick to discussing the issues rather than assume what is in the heart of the various posters here and characterize them.

It’s interesting that you use the phrase “hard of heart” when those are the words Jesus used to describe the people Moses was acquiescing to by making allowances for divorce and remarriage.

Also, as Pianist Clare pointed out the priests have been making these allowances for years now. Does it appear to be helping more Catholics become saints?

I can see how your personal situation affects your viewpoint that the ones in the messy D/R predicament are in pain and in need of sympathy and help. To be clear, I do sympathize with those in these difficult situations and believe they should be given all the help needed to resolve their difficulties, but without diluting the necessary reverence for the Holy Eucharist or Matrimony.

However, it’s unfair to characterize those who are trying to uphold the standards set by Jesus and the Church for millenium as mean spirited. Many of us are also in pain and in need of sympathy.

Divorce has wrecked havoc upon my own family tree. Our ancestors are all Catholic and my family of origin and the one I created are devout Catholic. The hope and purpose of my life is to perpetuate our Catholic inheritance down to our grandchildren and descendants.

I wrote an earlier post in this thread describing the pastoral guidance given to my own father: forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?p=13824171#post13824171

Both my siblings are now divorced as well, one of them for a second time.

Now my husband and I are divorced after 25 years and 5 kids. I was advised by several priests that I needed to separate for over 15 years and finally did. I never had any intention of divorcing or remarrying, only of preserving my health and safety so I sought a legal separation.

So many people would call my husband my “ex” and I would explain that we are still married but separated. They asked when I’ll get a divorce and I explained that because we are Catholic we won’t because our vows stated “until death do us part”. People would have an “aha” moment when I explained this and would say, “You know, you’re right that is how it’s supposed to be. I’ve just never known anyone who has actually lived that.”

I could at least take solace in the fact that even though we were a bad example of married life to our children and others, we could still be good examples of the truth of the indissolubility of marriage. Our kids would know that you only marry once and when you have problems you work them out or you may be alone the rest of your life.

I blame the increased availability of annulments as the reason for our marriage break up. Why? Because we spent $100,000 on marriage counselling over the years and my husband would be very agreeable during the sessions, but then he wouldn’t comply with what was agreed to when we would get home. So back to counselling we would go.

He didn’t want me to leave but he also didn’t want to make the necessary changes to make things work. During arguments with him it became clear by the comments he would make that he was weighing out the two choices he would face: either comply with the counselling or if she leaves me get an annulment and he warned me of his plan.

The annulment was his door of escape.

So now I’ve been served with divorce and he is applying for an annulment on the basis that he was too immature to enter into the marriage.

So will he be mature enough now to enter his second marriage? That marriage will be a sacrament and ours wasn’t? Was ours a “practice marriage”? And why didn’t he chose to grow in maturity over the course of 25 years and all that counselling?

I’m afraid AL and it’s after effects will not be helpful to my family maintaining it’s Catholic identity or helping my Dad or my husband to grow in holiness. Two of my kids have already left the faith. I feel rather abandoned by the Church.

An earlier posting mentioned that we are dealing with individual cases here, not the whole church. But as the Catechism states:

2385 Divorce is immoral also because it introduces disorder into the family and into society. This disorder brings grave harm to the deserted spouse, to children traumatized by the separation of their parents and often torn between them, and because of its contagious effect which makes it truly a plague on society.

So no, I am no better than anyone else including my Dad or husband. I just want our family to stay Catholic and most of all for every member to be together in Heaven!

I feel like I’m trying to hold my finger in a hole in the dike and it’s crumbling nevertheless. Instead of helping me to uphold the dam the recent actions of so many in the Church are only punching more holes in the wall.

 

[St_Francis]

But more to the point it is not the language she currently uses.

Has there been a change in the teachings of the Church? If not, then what difference does it make if I use the time-tested language or the language installed for the purpose of more clearly teaching non-Catholics?

 

[roseofshannon]

If the question cannot be answered, based on partial knowledge, then why not let a priest through a process of counselling answer it? He may come to the understanding from this process that the only valid marriage is the “remarriage.” So for this problem, the questions of “a coulpe in a D & R situation”, is the question that must first be answered. Are they really in a remarriage.

I see several issues coming from this letter, or that will arise. The above is the easiest. to answer. Marriage is not a Sacrament of the Church. It is the one Sacrament that existed from the beginning. This is what the annulment process discerns nullity, it does not provide nullity.

In other words, sometimes what seems to be divorce and remarriage is not actually divorce and remarriage.

The second are harder question will be when there is in fact a remarriage, but it was done without culpability.

The third situation would be where there is remarriage, with full culpability, and then repentence.

I’m afraid that unfortunately this would invite priest shopping to find the one who will give you want you want to hear.

 

[pnewton]

I’m afraid that unfortunately this would invite priest shopping to find the one who will give you want you want to hear.

It might. But then this would be a decision based on prudence. Already, if someone wanted communion illicitly, there is little to prevent them from just showing up at a parish they are not known.

 

[roseofshannon]

It might. But then this would be a decision based on prudence. Already, if someone wanted communion illicitly, there is little to prevent them from just showing up at a parish they are not known.

Wasn’t Jesus attempting to reform and make things uniform when he changed things from what Moses had allowed? Was he hard of heart?

 

[OraLabora]

So you are arguing that the fact that something doesn’t state that they may not must mean that they may? That makes no sense at all. If it is as clear as you say, that AL refers is allowing some divorced and remarried people to receive Communion, then why doesn’t it just state this? The whole assumption seems to be pinned on one footnote. A footnote that Pope Francis has said he can’t even remember.

The article that JimG linked to seems to suggest that my reading is shared by at least one other person, even if he disagrees with what was written. So it can’t be as obscure as you insist it is.

You are way out of line there. Why do you assume that. There are a great many of us (myself included) who have been away from the Church for decades and have been called back. There are far more prodigal sons than you might assume. Yes, I was up to my neck in mortal sin, but having been called back includes the need to resolve to sin no more.

Like I pointed out earlier, for me it took quite some time to resolve my irregular marriage. I was grateful for access to sacramental grace to help me get to the point where our relationship solidified to the point we had our marriage convalidated. So yes I have a great deal of empathy for those cut off from sacramental grace and some resentment at those among the laity who would presume to know better than our priests. You may think my priests were wrong in my case but it’s the way it played out for me, and I know I’m not alone.

Many of us are not being resentful at all. But it is starting to get rather irritating when people seem to be stating that AL is about allowing divorced and remarried people to receive Communion and that those of us who do not interpret it like this are being resentful. I think you are way out of order there and that your remark is extremely judgemental. You are also saying that if a person doesn’t accept your interpretation of AL they are being mean-spirited.

It isn’t just “my interpretation”. And you keep harping on the notion that AL is “all about allowing the D & R to receive communion”, as it if we think it’s a blanket licence when I know and have repeated here, ad nauseum, that I recognize that this is for the exceptional case. Moreover the rest of the document (which is not the subject of this thread) has much more to say than the situation of the D & R, and is well worth the read. It also happens that the D & R it is the subject of this thread so we aren’t discussing the other aspects of AL.

So please do me once, the favour, of saying you recognize that I am NOT suggesting that the D & R can now receive the Eucharist at will, and that only in certain specific cases with pastoral discernment. Can you at least ensure we are arguing about the right thing, and cut out this farce of reading more into what I say than what I say? I am not, repeat not, arguing in favour of the D & R receiving communion when they want, where they want. Can we at least correctly agree on the frame of reference of of this discussion? It will make it so much easier to have a civil debate because at the moment I’m getting increasingly angry at your blowing every thing I say way out of proportion.

The Eucharist is not simply some sort of ‘spiritual medicine’ the Eucharist is God. It isn’t a utilitarian tool to be used by the priest as he deems fit, according to what he views the needs of individuals.

Again you are putting words into my mouth that I have not said. I have said that the Eucharist is a source, perhaps the main source, of sacramental grace, God’s supreme Gift to us: the life of His only begotten Son. It is an extremely serious thing to cut people off of it, that recognize their mistakes and want to return. If I were saying that the Eucharist should be available to all the D & R, then you would be correct in accusing me of taking the Eucharist lightly. But for the Nth time, I have to tell you that this is NOT, repeat NOT what I am saying.

So you are arguing that if I am not divorced and remarried I ought not care about the Eucharist being treated potentially sacrilegiously?

I am arguing that neither I, nor you, are the “Eucharist police” nor the “confessional police” and that we have to trust our pastors, including the Holy Father.

None of my business? The Eucharist is not a tool, the Eucharist is God, my Lord, the one I ought to be prepared to die for. And you say that what happens to the Eucharist is none of my business?

Brendan, will you stop putting words in my mouth? I HAVE NEVER SAID IT IS NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS what happens to the Eucharist.

But as I said, neither I, nor you, are the “Eucharist police” in the wider sense of this discussion. It is one thing to call out someone at Mass who is desecrating the Eucharist by putting it in his pocket instead of consuming it on the spot, or do as I did once and pick up and consume a dropped Host, and quite another to assume that a discernment made inside a confessional based on an interpretation of the Holy Father’s exhortation automatically constitutes desecration if you happen to disagree with it.

Let go, and let God. Trust His Church, and His shepherds. If a priest errs a bit too much on the side of mercy from the goodness of his heart, I think Jesus can take it.

 

[pnewton]

Wasn’t Jesus attempting to reform and make things uniform …

Yes to the first, no to the second.

 

[pianistclare]

I’m sorry. I don’t understand.

Who is insisting on damning people?

Practically everyone in this thread! Oh my goodness.
People twist the pope’s words, and now mine.,
I’m out.
What a horrible thread.

 

[St_Francis]

If the question cannot be answered, based on partial knowledge, then why not let a priest through a process of counselling answer it?

We already have a process of discernment: the Tribunal, which gathers actual evidence instead of relying on the word of the most involved person.

He may come to the understanding from this process that the only valid marriage is the “remarriage.” So for this problem, the questions of “a coulpe in a D & R situation”, is the question that must first be answered. Are they really in a remarriage.

I see several issues coming from this letter, or that will arise. The above is the easiest. to answer. Marriage is not a Sacrament of the Church. It is the one Sacrament that existed from the beginning. This is what the annulment process discerns nullity, it does not provide nullity.

We don’t really know what is going on. An important issue would not normally be dealt with in a footnote, so istm that those who think the exhortation is indicating a change are coming to a currently unwarranted conclusion.

In other words, sometimes what seems to be divorce and remarriage is not actually divorce and remarriage.

Which is what the full annulment process determines.

The second are harder question will be when there is in fact a remarriage, but it was done without culpability.

Again, the culpability which separates one from the Eucharist is not just the remarriage but the ongoing sexual relationship.

The third situation would be where there is remarriage, with full culpability, and then repentence.

And yet again, repentance includes a purpose of amendment: an intention to “sin no more.”

 

[roseofshannon]

Practically everyone in this thread! Oh my goodness.
People twist the pope’s words, and now mine.,
I’m out.
What a horrible thread.

I’m sorry again. I wasn’t trying to be offensive in any way.

I was trying to understand what you were saying.

I don’t think this is a horrible thread. I think we are all good people here coming from different perspectives and trying to understand what the Pope is saying.

Even the Bishops, Priests and Cardinals are in disagreement about what the Pope is saying.

It’s not a bad thing to disagree as long as we stay respectful of each other and try to understand each other.

So again, I’m sorry. I meant no offence. I was just trying to understand you.

God Bless

 

[St_Francis]

Practically everyone in this thread! Oh my goodness.
People twist the pope’s words, and now mine.,
I’m out.
What a horrible thread.

Who is damning anyone? How are they doing it?

 

[roseofshannon]

We already have a process of discernment: the Tribunal, which gathers actual evidence instead of relying on the word of the most involved person.

Again, the culpability which separates one from the Eucharist is not just the remarriage but the ongoing sexual relationship.

It would actually mean separation/divorce of spouse #2 if there are no children involved.

 

[Brendan]

Nowhere does it categorically say they may not, in all circumstances, bar none. If it’s as clear cut and obvious as you suggest, why hasn’t this been clearly stated in AL?.

Likewise, if the conditions laid out in Familaris Consortio 84 had been revoked, that too would be clearly stated.

Barring such a revocation , that remains the teaching of the Church, and thus what pastors are called to teach.

 

[roseofshannon]

Also, if things are left to each priest to decide, it won’t only cause priest shopping but would also cause a myriad of headaches for the priests:

“Why did he get the okay and I don’t?”

“You want me to have to make all these sacrifices and they don’t?”

“Do you know how much I donate to this parish?”

“You gave them permission because they donate so much money didn’t you?”

Yikes!

 

[pnewton]

We already have a process of discernment: the Tribunal, which gathers actual evidence instead of relying on the word of the most involved person.

Which is what the full annulment process determines.

Yet what if it is wrong, and the couple know that it is wrong, because it is? “Objectively”, there is no sin in receiving communion if they are in the only valid marriage (in the eyes of God, as they themselves know).

This is what I was referring to allowing the priest to assist them with. Yes, we have the Tribunal. I would argue that now, thanks to this exhortation, we have more. Like I keep saying, time will tell, though I believe some priests have already been doing this.

 

[OraLabora]

Has there been a change in the teachings of the Church? If not, then what difference does it make if I use the time-tested language or the language installed for the purpose of more clearly teaching non-Catholics?

If the Church changed it, there was a reason: because it led to confusion.

 

[pnewton]

Also, if things are left to each priest to decide, it won’t only cause priest shopping but would also cause a myriad of headaches for the priests

I said from the first that what Pope Francis is proposing is difficult. It calls for a lot from the priests. Platitudes and forumulas are the easy route. Mercy is almost always the hardest road.

 

[OraLabora]

Also, as Pianist Clare pointed out the priests have been making these allowances for years now. Does it appear to be helping more Catholics become saints?

How could we know without knowing the individual cases involved? For all we know it may have helped them, if not become saints, progress in their conversion. The nature of these cases is that they are private, thus we cannot draw any conclusions.

But most likely it helped some, but not others. If you ask me the fact that it helped some and not others should mean we need to leave that door open. We can’t penalize those who benefit to punish those who don’t.