Tough Question

 

He's Catholic - You Know, Like Dick Durbin and Noted Theologian Nancy Pelosi

CNA Staff, Jul 9, 2020 / 10:30 am MT (CNA).- Former vice president Joe Biden pledged on Wednesday to reinstate Obama-era policies that would require the Little Sisters of the Poor to ensure access to birth control and abortifacients for employees in violation of their religious beliefs.

Biden, who is the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, made the promise July 8, following the Supreme Court decision in favor of the Little Sisters of the Poor in the case Little Sisters of the Poor v. Pennsylvania, which upheld an exemption for the sisters from the “contraception mandate” which obliges employers to provide for contraceptive coverage for employees through their health care plans.

“If I am elected I will restore the Obama-Biden policy that existed before the [Supreme Court’s 2014] Hobby Lobby ruling: providing an exemption for houses of worship and an accommodation for nonprofit organizations with religious missions,” said Biden in a statement released by his campaign. 

“This accommodation will allow women at these organizations to access contraceptive coverage, not through their employer-provided plan, but instead through their insurance company or a third-party administrator.”

One Believes in Something, One Does Not

Cardinal Timothy Dolan of the Archdiocese of New York has responded to questions about the denial of Holy Communion to former Vice President Joe Biden last Sunday.

During an Oct. 31 interview with Fox News, Cardinal Dolan said that he thought the incident was a good teaching moment about the Eucharist and the seriousness of denying Church teaching, but that he would not himself deny anyone reception of the Eucharist.

“So whether that prudential judgment was wise, I don’t want to judge him either,” Cardinal Dolan said of Father Robert Morey, who denied Holy Communion to Biden. “I wouldn’t do it.”

“Sometimes a public figure will come and talk to me about it. And I would advise them, and I think that priest [Morey] had a good point: You are publicly at odds with an issue of substance, critical substance, we’re talking about life and death and the Church,” Cardinal Dolan said.

Receiving the Eucharist “implies that you’re in union with all the Church believes and stands for. If, you know, you’re not, well, integrity would say, ‘Uh oh, I better not approach Holy Communion.’ That’s always preferable than to make a split-second decision and denying somebody,” Cardinal Dolan added.

Mustn't be judgemental, right Cardinal?

Are Jesuits Really Catholic? Hard to say...

Former Vice President Joe Biden was not allowed to participate in communion at the Saint Anthony Catholic Church in Florence, South Carolina on Sunday. Father Robert Morey told the Florence Morning News he denied Biden, a lifelong Catholic, from participating in the Holy Communion because of his stance on abortion.

“Sadly, this past Sunday, I had to refuse Holy Communion to former Vice President Joe Biden,” Morey told the Florence Morning News. “Holy Communion signifies we are one with God, each other and the Church. Our actions should reflect that. Any public figure who advocates for abortion places himself or herself outside of Church teaching.”

Didn't receive Communion, but got a swell ice cream cone instead. It's all the same to me!

 Let's see what the Jesuits have to say...


What remains unclear is whether other priests might take a cue from Morey when it comes to Biden’s stance on abortion, which the Catholic Church counts as a sin. Pope Francis has asserted church opposition against abortion, equating it to “hiring a hit man” to resolve a problem, but also suggested that communion should not be withheld from practicing Catholics based on a specific belief.

“The Eucharist … is not a prize for the perfect but a powerful medicine and nourishment for the weak,” Francis wrote in 2013.

John Carr, director of the Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life at Georgetown University, said that “it’s a big loss for our faith and for our church, either way, when the Eucharist becomes a source of division instead of unity.”

“In my view, denying communion to people for their public stances is bad theology, bad pastoral practice and bad politics,” added Carr, who spent two decades as an adviser to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.