"Let's be honest: The bishops' proposal has little to do with theology and much to do with politics. If the bishops were actually looking for coherence of a moral sort from political actors, they would be issuing excommunication notices faster than Republicans suppress the vote."
Well, it looks like — barring a last-minute intervention by Pope Francis himself, and maybe not even then — the U.S. bishops will consider and vote on a proposal for a teaching document about Communion that includes denying the sacrament to politicians who support pro-choice policies, including our nation's second Catholic president, Joe Biden.
The bishops' discussion — if you can call it that — and vote will happen at the virtual assembly June 16-18.
We say: Just do it.
Just do it, so that if there happens to be a Catholic remaining who is not convinced that the bishops' conference, as it stands today, has become completely irrelevant and ineffectual, they will be crystal clear about that reality after the conference leaders move forward with this patently bad idea.
Despite plans to bury the real reason for the document in language about "eucharistic coherence," this move is clearly aimed at Biden and the practice of his faith. Although Biden has said he is personally opposed to abortion, he has, as a politician, supported his party's stance on the issue, including the most recent proposal to remove the decades-old ban on federal funding for the procedure.
The bishops' plan is a terrible idea, first and foremost, because such excessive attention to the worthiness of those receiving Communion is contrary to a proper, traditional theology of the sacraments, which sees them as "not a prize for the perfect but a powerful medicine and nourishment for the weak," as Pope Francis said in Evangelii Gaudium. (And don't let speeches about how no one believes in the Real Presence anymore sway you, as those pontificators will likely be quoting a flawed survey. Most Catholics still know to genuflect when they cross in front of the tabernacle.)
We can think of no one who needs this "powerful medicine and nourishment" more than the president, who is faced with a pandemic, massive income inequality and racial reckoning, and the most serious threats to our democracy since the Civil War, not to mention the prospect of irreversible damage to the planet. That he happens to be a lifelong, churchgoing Catholic makes this all the sadder.
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