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Mystified Mahony

Can and Should Bishops Deny Communion to Pro-Abortion Politicians?

BY CHRISTOPHER ZEHNDER

"I'm slightly mystified why this all coming up now," said Cardinal Roger Mahony in a May 14 interview with Catholic News Service. What has mystified His Eminence? The fact that a few American bishops have said that they will refuse communion to public officials who support "abortion rights." According to Catholics for a Free Choice, a pro-abortion group, four bishops have said they will deny communion to pro-abortion politicians, while 17 have said they would advise them to refrain from the sacrament; 138 said they would not impose communion as a sanction. The four bishops who would refuse communion are Archbishop Raymond Burke of St. Louis (a canon lawyer and the first to bring up the issue) and Bishops Joseph Galante of Camden, New Jersey; Michael Sheridan of Colorado Springs; and Fabian Bruskewitz of Lincoln, Nebraska.

Cardinal Mahony has cast his red hat into the ring in the debate over communion. The cardinal's mystification arises from the fact that as, he said, "we've had pro-choice Catholic politicians going to Communion since Roe vs. Wade" -- that is, since 1973. Why have the bishops done nothing about this before?

"I'm mystified, too, but for different reasons," said Michael Dunnigan of the St. Joseph Foundation, a San Antonio, Texas, organization that specializes in canon law. I had contacted Dunnigan in late May for his thoughts on the current debate about communion sanctions. Why is Dunnigan also mystified? Because "so few American bishops have taken any action at all to address the scandal of so-called pro-choice politicians proclaiming themselves faithful Catholics and continuing to receive communion."

But Cardinal Mahony gives this explanation of episcopal silence in the face of this "scandal." "The church has always been quite cautious about denying anyone the sacraments of the church," he told Catholic News Service. Mahony opined that a priest or bishop cannot "deny someone communion unless that person is known to have been a public sinner" -- that is, unless the person has been "interdicted or excommunicated or formally sanctioned in some way." Cardinal Mahony told the May 13 National Catholic Reporter that denial of communion can only follow a judicial process "that leads to formal guilt, that then leads to sanctions. Obviously, we don't have that situation."

The cardinal's opinion, besides contradicting the opinions of some of his brother bishops, flies in the face of statements made by one of Holy See's highest ranking cardinals. On April 23, a reporter asked Cardinal Francis Arinze, president of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, whether "unambiguously pro-abortion" politicians should be refused communion. Arinze said "if the person should not receive it, then it should not be given. Objectively, the answer is there." But what about a more concrete situation, a journalist asked Arinze -- what about the case of pro-abortion Catholic presidential candidate, Senator John Kerry? "The norm of the Church is clear," he said. "The Catholic Church exists in the U.S.A. and there are bishops there. Let them interpret."

Cardinal Mahony has interpreted the "norm of the Church," but to Michael Dunnigan, he has misinterpreted it. While Dunnigan agreed that excommunicated or interdicted persons should not be given communion, Church law, he said, doesn't limit this sanction to those persons. Dunnigan quoted canon 915, which also includes among those to be refused communion "others who obstinately persist in manifest grave sin." "This is not an issue of penal law," said Dunnigan, "but of sacramental discipline. When a person has been excommunicated or interdicted, he is prohibited from receiving any of the sacraments, but the canon under which Archbishop Burke has acted is a separate provision that applies specifically to the Eucharist but not to the other sacraments."

Cardinal Mahony, said Dunnigan, equates "the category of public sinners with the subcategories of persons who have been excommunicated or interdicted, but the law makes clear that, although the category of public sinners includes excommunicated and interdicted persons, it includes other persons as well."

Dunnigan said that Cardinal Mahony's contention that the decision to receive communion rests with the communicant, "not the person giving communion," arises from a confusion. "Canonist Edward Peters [of Ave Maria College in Michigan]," said Dunnigan, "has said the following about this particular statement: 'the cardinal is confusing canon 916, wherein an individual who is conscious of being in grave sin should indeed refrain from receiving the Eucharist, even if no else is aware of his sin, with canon 915, wherein a minister who is aware of an individual's obstinate persistence in manifest grave sin must not admit such person to the Eucharist."

Dunnigan pointed out that those refused communion by a bishop are not without recourse. "They may petition the Holy See and seek a review of the decision through the Church's system of administrative justice." Or, presumably, they could change their ways.

But using sanctions is not, in Mahony's opinion, the most effective way to change the ways of pro-abortion legislators. The Church must convince people that supporting abortion is wrong. The path of education which, according to the cardinal, has been the path of the Church in the United States, has been most effective. "What the church has been doing has had great success," Mahony told Catholic News Service. According to latest polls, support for untrammeled abortion "has dropped from 64 to 55 percent." Mahony said that efforts to educate people about the evils of abortion would be "dealt a very negative blow if all of sudden the church starts sanctioning people."

As far as Catholic politicians go, Mahony said he thought regular dialogue with them on political issues in the light of Catholic moral and social teaching would be more effective than sanctions. Such dialogue, said the cardinal, is "our responsibility. We have not been doing that effectively." The Church should also increase its efforts to inform Catholic voters on their responsibilities and educate them in the teachings of the Church.

Dunnigan said he thinks the "education only" approach espoused by Cardinal Mahony has failed. "The cardinal himself acknowledges that American Church leaders have done a poor job of educating the faithful. In my opinion, Catholics in America never have been as ignorant about their faith as they are today, and once they do become aware of what their faith requires, they seem more willing than ever to reject the 'hard sayings' of the Faith. One of the circumstances that has brought about this situation is the fact that the bishops have taken so little action against our national epidemic of moral schizophrenia: the host of politicians who promote abortion in public but still claim that they remain faithful Catholics in their private lives."

But, in his National Catholic Reporter interview, Cardinal Mahony hinted that the bishops "rattling sanctions," as he put it, are being inconsistent. "In Evangelium Vitae, our Holy Father expressed many areas of concern with life issues, not just this one [abortion]," said Mahony. "In fact, he hit the death penalty as hard as many of the others. You have Catholic politicians who may be in favor of one but not the other. They're following their own different lights on these issues." Here the cardinal echoed other critics of sanctions, who have asked why Catholic politicians who have not only supported the death penalty but those who backed the latest war in Iraq (which the Holy See condemned) are not also subject to sanctions.

Dunnigan thinks that comparing the "Church's constant and unchangeable teaching against abortion with the Holy Father's prudential criticism of capital punishment is like comparing apples and submarines. The Church teaching has always been against abortion, but it never has been against capital punishment. The Catechism places constraints on the state's use of capital punishment, but it acknowledges that Catholic teaching by no means excludes capital punishment."

Michael Baxter, professor of theology at the University of Notre Dame in Indiana, agrees that distinctions must be made between abortion and such issues as capital punishment and war. "The death penalty and war are not intrinsic evils, according to Church teaching," said Baxter, who also directs the Catholic Peace Fellowship. "They are evil in certain situations and not in others, whereas abortion is always and everywhere evil -- it is an intrinsic evil."

This distinction may account for the apparent discrepancy between episcopal actions vis-a-vis abortion and those pertaining to capital punishment or a particular war. "It's easier to come out with a statement from on high when it comes to intrinsic evil -- you say these are wrong in all cases," Baxter opined. "It's a lot more complicated when you say, 'this war is wrong,' because then you get into disagreements among people as to whether or not the conditions for a just war were met."

But Baxter thinks not only bishops can but should make statements on the morality of capital punishment in a particular context or of a particular war. One bishop who has done so is John Michael Botean, bishop of the Romanian Catholic Church in the United States. In an Ash Wednesday, 2003 pastoral Bishop Botean warned his flock that since the war against Iraq did not meet the traditional standards for a just war, those who participate in it would be committing mortal sin. Though Botean came under fire for his pastoral for, it was claimed, exceeding his authority, Baxter thinks the bishop was justified. Whether a particular war is just or not, said Baxter, is not just "anyone's opinion; a war is either objectively just or not; and just because war is not an intrinsic evil, doesn't mean a particular war is not evil. War is not intrinsically evil, but this war, if it contradicts the natural law, is evil."

In speaking out against particular evils -- such as this war -- a bishop, said Baxter, "is exhorting people and challenging people to make their own judgements. People don't need to be told that they need to make their own judgements; they need to be told what's at stake."

But what about bishops levying sanctions (such as refusal of communion) not only account of abortion, but for support of an unjust war? Should this ever be done? "Sanctions are not out of the question," Baxter said. But though Baxter here seemed to disagree with Cardinal Mahony, he added, " but why not persuade first?" Baxter said sanctions against Catholic politicians who support policies opposed to Catholic moral teaching should only follow attempts by bishops to convince the erring of their error. Baxter said he favors "a personal approach -- having them over for dinner, talking about the issues in detail, sharing views in a kind of non-confrontational way at first to try to explain to the person what the Church teaches on these things and why. Maybe setting up a string of meetings over the next six months in a non-public way."

But what about particularly egregious cases, where a politician not only quietly votes for pro-abortion legislation but actively and publicly pushes such laws? "I think the bishop should come out and make public statements, trying to be as forceful and compelling as possible, with an eye toward the public (that's who you want to persuade) -- not laying down administrative and canonical censures, but trying to persuade people about what we think is a heinous practice."

Baxter agreed that the bishops have not come out strongly enough about moral issues -- and that the Church must come out strongly on these matters. "But the question is, in what way? Saying what?" he asked. "I suppose it's in some sense good that the issue of communion is being raised. I hope a lot more people start thinking more about the Eucharist, what it is, what it means." But without persuasion, any measures such as sanctions may appear as just "one press release versus the other; one news article versus the other. And the impression given in that, is" Baxter said, "well, everyone has his own opinion -- just what the bishops don't want to imply. Right now it comes off as this power play, and it's lopsided. It makes it seem like the bishops are saying, 'really, a good Catholic will vote Republican.'"

What form sanctions, such as refusing communion, can take is important, Baxter said. "Right now this might backfire on a lot of bishops. "Writing letters and citing canon law makes it look like a legalistic, bloodless application of a regulation, and what you want to do is convey the impression that there's so much at stake here. It's a matter of peoples' hearts and souls."

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