Canon lawyer Ed Peters is batting around Canon 915 — withholding communion from someone who persists in grave sin — and says the most obvious case for applying the canon seems to be Nancy Pelosi:

I suggest that there is no US Catholic politician whose conduct at the national level is more stridently and widely pro-abortion (to name just one area in which Pelosi’s machinations are gravely objectionable) and whose scandalous rhetoric is more overtly Catholic (many of her bizarre assertions the bishops have had to stop and refute) than is Nancy Pelosi’s. If her prolonged public conduct does not qualify as obstinent perseverance in manifest grave sin, then, in all sincerity, I must admit to not knowing what would constitute obstinent perseverance in manifest grave sin.

But, if I am right about the objectively evil quality of Pelosi’s public conduct, then hers should be the first case in which Canon 915 is applied…

I would argue that there is one political figure more deserving of having the Canon applied: Rudy Giuliani. Has he ever had his second marriage annulled? Or his third marriage convalidated?

If not, then why are we seeing things like this spectacle (and at a papal mass, no less)?

More from Beliefnet and our partners
Close Ad