Springfield, Ill., Jul 20, 2016 / 12:04 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Some news reports got it wrong: Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput’s guidelines on Holy Communion and divorce-and-remarriage were “certainly correct” and in line with Pope Francis and Catholic teaching, an Illinois bishop has said.
“The Bible clearly teaches about the proper disposition to receive Holy Communion in the First Letter to the Corinthians,” Bishop Thomas Paprocki of Springfield in Illinois said July 15.
St. Paul says in that letter that those who receive unworthily will be “guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord.”
Canon law reflects this biblical teaching, the bishop said in the Illinois newspaper the State Journal-Register.
Bishop Paprocki criticized press coverage of Archbishop Chaput’s response to the Pope’s 2016 apostolic exhortation Amoris laetitia. He said an Associated Press report was misleading to say that Archbishop Chaput was “closing the door opened by Pope Francis to letting civilly remarried Catholics receive Communion.”
Reiterating his April 8 remarks, the bishop said that the apostolic exhortation made no changes to canon law or church doctrine.
Archbishop Chaput on July 1 issued pastoral guidelines for his archdiocese on the Pope’s exhortation. He said the document is best understood when read “within the tradition of the Church’s teaching and life.”
Bishop Paprocki agreed. He said the archbishop’s guidelines are right to say that all Catholics, not only those who have divorced-and-remarried, must confess all serious sins and have a firm purpose of amendment before receiving Holy Communion. Chaput’s guidelines said those who have civilly remarried must work to live “as brother and sister” in this relationship to receive reconciliation in the Sacrament of Penance, which would then allow for them to receive Communion.
The archbishop’s guidance drew widespread and sometimes critical reactions. Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney on Twitter snapped that Archbishop Chaput’s comments “are not Christian.”
But for the Bishop of Springfield, the guidance was useful.
“This applies not only in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, but also here in the Diocese of Springfield in Illinois, as it does elsewhere in the Church,” Bishop Paprocki said.
According to Bishop Paprocki, Catholics in irregular relationships have a free choice.
“(I)f they persist in sexual activity outside of valid marriage, they must refrain from taking Holy Communion; if they wish to receive Holy Communion, they must refrain from sexual activity outside of valid marriage,” he said, citing the Gospel of Matthew.
“The latter may seem impossible to those steeped in our sex-saturated culture, but ‘with God, all things are possible’.”
Article Archive
Bishop Paprocki: Don't be misled, Archbishop Chaput got it right on marriage
Related Articles • More Articles
Asian elephant. / Credit: Filiz Elaerts / Unsplash (CC0)CNA Newsroom, Mar 27, 2024 / 13:00 pm (CNA).Despite repeated protests from Catholic bishops, wildlife attacks continue to pose a severe threat to the lives and properties of both Catholics and other residents in the Southern Indian state of Kerala. On Wednesday, local media reported significant damage from two elephants in Kerala's Idukki district, alongside a tiger's attack on livestock. This year alone, elephant attacks have resulted in 27 fatalities in the region. Video footage of a Catholic man trampled to death on Feb. 10 made headlines and sparked protests, only to be followed by news of a potential mauling by a tiger of a Catholic woman on her way to Mass four days after the fatal attack. Further fatal elephant tramplings followed the incident.The Catholic Church in Kerala has been leading the charge in urging the government to take decisive action to protect human lives. "The series of shocking ...
Catholic faithful offer prayers during an Ash Wednesday Mass at St. Mary's Basilica in Secunderabad, the twin city of Hyderabad in India on Feb. 14, 2024. / Credit: NOAH SEELAM/AFP via Getty ImagesBangalore, India, Mar 27, 2024 / 14:00 pm (CNA).A watchdog group that monitors violence committed against Christians in India has released a study documenting 161 such crimes in the first 75 days of 2024.These numbers may underestimate the number of crimes and acts of persecution committed against Christians in India, according to A.C. Michael, a Catholic and coordinator of the United Christian Forum (UCF), which released the report. "These figures are based only on the complaints registered on our toll-free helpline number (1-800-208-4545) to report incidents of anti-Christian violence. The actual numbers will be certainly much more," Michael told CNA on March 27."We feel frustrated that despite documenting and making public the shocking data regularly, there has been no re...
On Holy Wednesday, the friars of the Custody of the Holy Land venerated the column to which, according to tradition, Jesus was bound to be scourged. They prayed the station dedicated to the column during the daily procession that the Franciscans perform inside the Basilica of the Holy Sepulcher. At the end, they intoned the hymn "Columna Nobilis" and then, one by one, they performed an act of veneration. March 27, 2024. / Credit: Marinella BandiniJerusalem, Mar 27, 2024 / 15:00 pm (CNA).In Jerusalem on Holy Wednesday, the friars of the Custody of the Holy Land venerate the two stones that, according to the Gospel of Luke, were stained with the blood of Jesus during his passion.The first stone is venerated at the Basilica of the Agony, which stands at the place where Jesus withdrew to pray after the Last Supper in an orchard known as Gethsemane at the foot of the Mount of Olives.Father Alessandro Coniglio, who presided over the Holy Wednesday Mass at the Basilica of the Agony (G...