Kerry's Catholicism

Factual Questions
1

I had originally thought that the church that Kerry belongs to is a sect that broke off from the Roman Catholic Church because of theoligical/doctrinal differences.

Then there was the whole communion controversy and I became confused.

If this was a sect that broke off from the RCC why would a RCC Bishop have any authority in imposing prohibitions?

If there hadn’t been any break with the RCC, which is set up hierarchically with strictly defined doctrines, how could an individual church community officially state differences with RCC doctrine without facing excommunication?

How much dissent does the RCC tolerate? I was educated by Jesuits and those wise-asses were are constantly being threatened with excommunication for proposing new interpretations on matters of faith.

I’m not very educated on this matter and am aware that some of the assumptions I have put forth may be entirely wrong. That’s why I’m here. Please correct me where necessary.

2

Catholicism doesn’t have a heck of a lot of schisms, Kerry is a plain old vanilla Catholic. He did find a priest who was willing to give communion, but this was not in an off-shoot branch of the religion, just a church with a more tolerant priest.

I understand Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (Head Vatican Honcho on details such as this) has made a more recent statement saying “No, really, I mean it. Don’t give Kerry that Body of Christ thing!”

3

Catholic have a degree of diversity, even if it is unofficial and not supported. Excommunication is not something done lightly, and it is up to the individual bishop to serve his people and they vary in approach and attitudes. Some allow more than others. Also keep in mind that the media has a lot of stories “pre-written,” i.e., businessmen are evil, cops are corrupt, professional military types are killers, and the Catholic church is intolerant, except, of course, for sexual perverts. Disciplining a straying priest requires a judgement call on how far out he is, what effect he is having on his parishoners, and what the effect of such discipline would be on the church itself. A bishop might decide that correcting an errant priest would cause more harm than allowing him to profess or practice whatever it is causing the problem. Who needs a bunch of newspaper stories talking about how so and so is being punished for his beliefs, while so much money is being used to coverup abuse?
It seems to me that Kerry is a “political” Catholic - the politics of an issue affects his beliefs. So he says life begins at conception, is personally opposed to abortion, but does not feel that he should work to prohibit it since it would mean imposing his views on others. So murder is bad, unless of course, a majority of voters want it. Other high level politicians like Rudolph Giuliani and Mario Cuomo also take that approach to stradle the line. Their real religion is politics.

4

It’s Mel Gibson who attends an offshoot of the Roman Catholic Church.

http://christianity.about.com/cs/themovies/a/passion.htm

5

The Church’s move to demonize John Kerry over his pro-choice stance on abortion is rather strange. They never made any such move toward Rudy Giuliani, Arnold Schwarzeneggar, or Teddy Kennedy. Now that John Kerry is running for president, though, they send out this edict ordering priests to deny him the sacrements. Kerry has had no problem finding parishes where he’s welcome, so you have to wonder if it was all for show.

6

I suspect that the Church did make some noise toward Kennedy/Guiliani/other Catholic politicians regarding their stance on abortion, it just didn’t get the press coverage outside the district/local area. When I was younger I lived in a heavily Catholic area (Erie) and the local Congressman (at the time, Tom Ridge), though relatively conservative on abortion, made a couple votes that were on the wrong side of the issue, as far as the zealots were concerned (IIRC, one of them was related to availability of abortions in DoD hospitals overseas). Because he wasn’t lock-step in agreement with the Church, the local bishop came down on him a bit for it.

7

The memo didn’t mention Kerry. It specified Catholic politicians in general.

If it were to be applied, some pro-choice, Catholic Republicans would be affected as well. And rightly so, since this cuts across party lines.

8

If Kerry’s church was not in communion with Rome, then of course the RC bishop would have no authority over him or his church. But that’s not the case, since Kerry’s church is indeed a regular Roman Catholic church.

Sean O’Malley is the archbishop of Kerry’s diocese, and as such he has the authority to prohibit Kerry from receiving communion. Indeed, he has stated that a Catholic politician who publicly supports abortion rights is in grave sin, and should therefore refrain from communion (this follows from the Catholic principle that communicants should not be in a state of sin; if you’ve commited a mortal sin and haven’t received absolution, you’re commiting an even graver offense by going on to receive the Eucharist). But it’s up to the individual politician to recognize this–Archbishop O’Malley has also said that “the church presumes each person is receiving in good faith. It is not our policy to deny communion. It is up to the individual” (cite).

Archbishop O’Malley has clearly hinted that Kerry shouldn’t be receiving communion with a clear conscience, but so far, he hasn’t made it an official policy to deny communion to Kerry, or to any other pro-choice Catholic politician–therefore none of the churches in his diocese are obligated to deny Kerry communion.

What if O’Malley did make it an official policy? As bishop over Kerry’s diocese, he could do so, and then the churches of his diocese would be bound to follow that decision–the priests at Kerry’s church would then have to deny Kerry communion. Indeed, the archbishop of St. Louis, Raymond Burke, announced that he would not allow Kerry to receive communion at any Catholic church in St. Louis. So far as I know, Kerry did not test Burke’s pronouncement, but in any case, it only applied to the St. Louis diocese, and had no impact on Kerry’s diocese.

If O’Malley did make it an official policy to deny communion specifically to Kerry, and his church continued to give him communion, then the priests at Kerry’s church would be at odds with the bishop, and in some serious trouble. Kerry would face the same situation at any Catholic church in that diocese–but only in that diocese.

Needless to say, if Kerry were excommunicated, then he couldn’t receive communion or any other sacraments from any RC church in the world, and any priest that insisted on giving him communion would be in heresy with Rome.

9

Michigan’s governor, Jennifer Granholm, is another pro-abortion Catholic. Local clergy have made some noise over this, and I believe that the archbishop of Detroit has published a statement. I don’t know if Granholm receives communion or not.

10

I should clarify the first sentence of my second paragraph: “Sean O’Malley is the archbishop of Kerry’s diocese, and as such he has the authority to prohibit Kerry from receiving communion within his diocese.”

The most extreme pronouncements so far are from Bishop Michael Sheridan of Colorado Springs, who has said that Catholics who vote for pro-choice politicians should refrain from communion, and Archbishop Burke of the St. Louis diocese, who has even declared he would prohibit such Catholic voters from receiving communion.

It should be stressed that many other bishops disagree with Sheridan and Burke, and that Sheridan and Burke’s decisions (whatever they finally are) only apply to their diocese and not to the Roman Catholic church as a whole–only the pope has that authority.

11

I would think that if John Kerry worshipped at a breakaway Catholic Church, he would likely not be getting too far in politics. The far left wings and the far right wings of Catholicism tend to alienate the great undifferentiated mass of American Catholics, who have political opinions all over the board.

12

The point has been made in this thread, but I would like to make it explicit:

“The Church” hasn’t done anything in regards to Kerry. A (fairly small) number of bishops (supported by a larger, but still small, number of lay persons) have established views on abortion as a shibboleth to act as a gate to determine who “real Catholics” are. That group may or may not be correct in their perceptions, but they are expressing those views in ways that have not been embraced by the church, at large, or even by a majority of bishops.

For any Catholic (bishop) who points to absolute opposition to abortion as a go/ no-go gauge for Catholicism to insist that Kerry must not be supported, there are several others who can point to expressed views on the death penalty, just war theory, or a host of other teachings and declare that George Bush must not be supported.

(A couple of bishops have declared that the Iraq invasion was not a just war.)

In a multi-party parliamentary system, it is possible that the church might support a particular party in which all the candidates support “Catholic” values. In a two-party Congressional/Presidential system, the majority of church leaders realize that few candidates will ever support all Catholic issues and Catholics are expected to prayerfully examine the candidates a choose the one who most closely approaches church teachings–a subjective test, at best.