Communion, the divorced and condom use

The Tablet yesterday week commented on the publicly expressed divergent views of cardinals Walter Kasper and Lopez Trujillo.

The German cardinal said that the question of whether divorced and remarried Catholics should receive Holy Communion is still an open question, even though the Synod of Bishops took a public stand against it.

On the other hand Cardinal Trujillo promptly contradicted him, saying it was "neither disputed, nor disputable" and that the position could never change.

Cardinal Kasper has been disputing this position since he was Bishop of Rottenberg-Stuttgart. He and Cardinal Karl Lehmann of Mainz drew up a pastoral plan for the readmission to Communion of divorced and remarried Catholics, but were told to desist by the head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the man who is now Pope.

It is not often that you have such divergent views expressed by two senior members of the Roman Curia on subjects which are doctrinal and pastoral at the same time.

We feel that this debate is a healthy one. It is further evidence that Pope Benedict is more open to fruitful discussion that the media tried to show him to be and more open than when he was Prefect of the Congregation.

The Tablet notes that this issue was raised several times with Cardinal Ratzinger by many bishops, including those from England and Wales. His usual reply was: "My hands are tied."

The Catholic periodical comments that it is not clear "whether he meant tied by the inescapable logic of the Church's position, or by the unyielding attitude of the then Pope, John Paul II".

In the apostolic exhortation Familiaris Consortio 24 years ago Pope John Paul stated that the divorced who remarry "are unable to be admitted (to the Eucharist) from the fact that their state and condition of life objectively contradict that union of love between Christ and the Church, which is signified and effected by the Eucharist".

The Tablet then refers to an attitude adopted in many parishes in the West. "Given the difficulties of proving nullity under the Church's annulment rules, the great majority of people involved in marital breakdown find themselves in limbo.

"Not being able to prove a marriage's nullity with the degree of certainty required is not proof that it was valid in the first place. The couple concerned may be subjectively in good faith, sorry for their sins and wanting Communion for all the right reasons, and there may be little or no risk of scandal or hurt to others...

"Where such conditions exist, a priest may resort to the rule that forbids the public refusal of Communion because of the scandal it would cause, whether or not the priest is privately aware that the individual concerned is in a state of grace. In other words, the responsibility ultimately falls to the individual."

The editorial of The Tablet is just one example of what Cardinal Casper said about the ongoing discussion within the Church. Cardinal Casper is considered to be a liberal, while Cardinal Trujillo is considered to be very conservative.

The Tablet, being a liberal periodical, criticises Cardinal Trujillo, describing him as someone with a track record of going against the evidence. As an example it quotes "his insistence a while ago that condoms could not prevent transmission of the HIV/Aids virus".

This comment leads us to another debatable argument: the use or non-use of condoms in certain circumstances. Cardinal Christian Wiyghan Tumi, Archbishop of Douala, in an interview with the Deutsche Presse-Agentur (quoted in The Tablet), approved the use of condoms as a protective measure against HIV/Aids, provided the couples using them are married.

"If a partner in a marriage is infected with HIV, the use of condoms makes sense." Condom use would be permissible only within marriage but "possibly there can be a rethink there", the 75-year-old cardinal said. He did not expect the Vatican to stray from its official line against condom use and he agreed with its view that "loyalty and abstention remain still the best protection against Aids".

The Tablet quoted other Church leaders who spoke in similar vein. In February, Cardinal Georges Cottier, the theologian of the papal household, said the commandment "Thou shalt not kill" should be considered in cases where sexual activity involves a partner who is HIV-positive.

Cardinal Javier Lozano Barragan, who chairs the Pontifical Council for Health, believes the use of condoms to be acceptable when abstinence is not an option. Bishop Kevin Dowling of Rustenburg, South Africa, has said that opposition to condoms amounts to a death sentence for women who cannot insist on abstinence or fidelity.