The Catholic bishops have voted 222-8 to adopt a new document on Communion that calls on Catholic politicians to base their political views on “the Church’s faith and moral law.” The new document stopped short of saying whether pro-abortion politicians like Joe Biden should be denied communion.
The document, the “The Mystery of the Eucharist in the Life of the Church,” emphasized the “special responsibility” of Catholic elected officials to follow Church teachings.
The document does not mention Biden or any other politicians’ names, but it does emphasize that public figures who profess to be Catholic have a greater responsibility to live out their faith.
“Lay people who exercise some form of public authority have a special responsibility to embody Church teaching,” it reads.
Before the vote, Archbishop Samuel Aquila, an outspoken pro-life advocate, said the goal of the document was not about a rebuke to anyone but “to present a clear understanding of the Church’s teachings to bring heightened awareness among the faithful of how the Eucharist can transform our lives and bring us closer to our creator and the life he wants for us.”
“All of us understand that you have to be pastoral in dealing with these situations and that it is really important to have a dialogue with the person, for us as bishops,” Aquila said. “To speak with those who are in public life, no matter where they are in public life. That the positions they take influence those within the Catholic Church and can be a real scandal to those faithful who adhere to the teachings of the Church and the dignity of the human person.”
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The Catechism of the Catholic Church, which summarizes Church teaching, recognizes the inherent dignity and worth of the unborn human person and considers abortion a “crime against human life.”
“Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception,” the catechism reads. “From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person — among which is the inviolable right of every innocent being to life.”
According to Aquila, “the impact of one abortion is tremendous.”
“A unique human being is wiped out, as Pope Francis says, it’s murder,” he said. “And we have to help people to understand that and to see how it undermines all of society and also it changes the course of history.”
He shared a question he asks to demonstrate the consequences of one abortion.
“Sometimes to make the point, I just tell a person, “Think about if one of your grandparents, one of your four grandparents, had been aborted, you wouldn’t be here, but who else wouldn’t be here?’”
“People don’t think of it in those terms, let alone just the uniqueness and the dignity of human life,” he concluded. “But it is a gift that we have to protect and have a responsibility to protect.”
After the vote, Bishop Strickland spoke to his fellow bishops and emphasized the importance of abortion.
“I must speak for the babies,” he said, reminding everyone that it’s a “preeminent issue” and that the murder of unborn children “destroys the very foundation of our civilization” and that as a shepherd, he has to speak on this “abortion opens the door to evil, and allows Satan to run rampant through every aspect of human life.”
Though Biden claims to be Catholic, he is advancing the most radical pro-abortion agenda of any U.S. president in history, including plans to force taxpayers to pay for elective abortions all across the world.
Many Catholic bishops and other Christian leaders have expressed concerns that Biden’s radical abortion advocacy is misleading Catholics and creating scandal for the faith. They have said the church must do something to make it clear that Catholics cannot support abortion and must repent before participating in Communion.
Earlier this month, Biden met with Pope Francis at the Vatican. Afterward, the president said the pope told him he was a “good Catholic” and he should “keep receiving Communion”; however, the Vatican has not confirmed those remarks.
Biden openly defies church teachings about the sanctity of human life. After just 100 days in office, he surpassed President Barack Obama as the most pro-abortion president in U.S. history, including allowing mail-order abortions and trying to force taxpayers to fund abortions.
His administration also is fighting to overturn a pro-life Texas law that has saved thousands of unborn babies from abortion in the past two months. And it dropped a lawsuit defending a pro-life nurse from Vermont who was forced to participate in an abortion.
