My latest in PJ Media:
Is the ostentatiously devout Catholic Joe Biden, who wore a Rosary (or was it wire?) on his wrist while debating Donald Trump, really a bad Catholic? Prolife Catholics have been saying so for years, and now a leading bishop has spoken up on their side. The Catholic News Agency reported Tuesday that Cardinal Raymond Burke, “a canon lawyer and formerly the prefect of the Church’s highest court, has said that Catholic politicians supporting abortion should not receive Holy Communion, including pro-choice Catholic presidential candidate Joe Biden.”
That’s the kind of statement that makes you formerly the “prefect of the Church’s highest court.”
Biden, Burke asserted, “is not a Catholic in good standing and he should not approach to receive Holy Communion,” because “a Catholic may not support abortion in any shape or form because it is one of the most grievous sins against human life.”
If that is the case, then Biden is clearly not a Catholic in good standing. Accordingly, Burke stated, “I would tell him not to approach Holy Communion out of charity toward him, because that would be a sacrilege, and a danger to the salvation of his own soul. But also he should not approach to receive Holy Communion because he gives scandal to everyone. Because if someone says ‘well, I’m a devout Catholic’ and at the same time is promoting abortion, it gives the impression to others that it’s acceptable for a Catholic to be in favor of abortion and of course it’s absolutely not acceptable. It never has been, it never will be.”
The good Cardinal is right in a sense. That is indeed the teaching of the Catholic Church. But teaching is one thing and practice is quite enough. Pope Francis has repeatedly made it clear that as far as he is concerned, the real sins, the real serious sins that get you a tongue-lashing from the Roman Pontiff and doubtless a date with hellfire in the age to come, are opposing mass Muslim migration into the West and believing that Islam is not a religion of peace. Abortion? Come on, man! That’s child’s play, so to speak, compared to the big sins.
There is much more. Read the rest here.