LETTER TO THE EDITOR OF THE CATHOLIC HERALD
PUBLISHED ON 7 FEBRUARY 2014
SIR – It is rewarding to see that my article on the possibility of readmitting to Holy Communion those in apparently irregular marriages (Feature, January 17) has stirred some of your readers to respond. However, I could not help but note with interest that of the four respondents published, three were priests and the other was a layman (Letters, January 31). I mention this because so many women have been in direct contact with me, grateful for what I had written and encouraging me to continue to explore a way forward. And just for the record, quite a number of priests and laymen have contacted me with encouraging comments too.
None of your correspondents deals with the central argument of my article: namely that for all our insistence, we so often fail to give witness to the sanctity of marriage in our pastoral practice. Yet each of them seems somehow to have concluded that I am seeking to undermine the authority of the Church. I find this baffling because I have never questioned the de fide teaching on the sacramental and indissoluble nature of Christian marriage and did not do so in the article. What I do find less than foolproof is the unfolding story of the Church’s efforts to defend this belief in its theology and pastoral practice. May I illustrate this simply by posing the not uncommon situation of two Christians, from traditions other than Catholic, who marry in a register office? They are not bound by canonical form and therefore their marriage is regarded by the Church as an indissoluble sacrament, for since the publication of the 1917 Code of Canon Law, the sole criterion is the fact of their baptism, not whether they believe or practise their faith. Now if their marriage fails and one of them should happen to fall in love with a Catholic, our only recourse is to see if there are grounds to seek an annulment of the original civil union.
When I was doing the research in the 1990s I recall asking one of our bishops who was on his way to Rome, to raise the above question and a number of similar ones with the then Cardinal Ratzinger. On his return he assured me that the Cardinal admitted there was still homework to be done. It is high time the homework was done. As we struggle to live fulfilled lives here on earth, it is true that if we are to be faithful to the Gospel we will probably have to suffer much, but Jesus did warn us not to lay unnecessary burdens. My challenge to all of you who seem to suggest that the Church has all the answers in this field and that there is nothing further to examine would be this: how can you be so sure? This attitude reminds me of those priests who refused to cooperate with my research all those years ago, stating that the bishops had no right to invite me to undertake the work in the first place because the Church’s teaching and the Scriptures were unambiguous. And once again the Orthodox tradition is dismissed in one of the letters, suggesting we have nothing to learn from them. When will we learn a little humility and recognise with the Orthodox that there is much that is mystery which we can never know for certain?
People often point to Jesus as having given us definitive direction when he was disputing with the Pharisees and reminded them of the Genesis text: “What God has joined together, let no man put asunder.” The fascinating thing about this is that Jesus was not speaking here about “marriage in the Lord”, but about all marriages, so how was Paul able to give leave to the early converts to separate and move on if they could not live in peace?
Jesus came to heal the hurt and division in our broken world. Pope Francis is constantly urging the clergy to take up this mission of Christ and he tells us that we should be “shepherds living with the smell of the sheep”, but in this field how can we, if our only recourse is to a language which for many goes nowhere near touching their lived experience? I too know those who willingly accept that they are unable to receive Holy Communion because of the present discipline and who accept the pain and suffering that goes with it; and I admire them and know they are close to God. But I also know far more who have felt rejected and abandoned and who in sadness have gone their own way. Should we not be searching for ways of helping them to get their lives together again, rather than telling them that the only way to please God is to live without the comfort of another human being?
Dare I suggest that if ever there was a time when the clergy would do well to step back from laying down the law, it is surely now?
Timothy J. Buckley, CSsR
