VATICAN CITY — On April 23, Cardinal Francis Arinze, prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Sacraments, was asked at a press conference whether unambiguously pro-abortion Catholic politicians should be refused holy Communion. The cardinal, who is the highest-ranking Church official for questions regarding the Sacraments, responded that indeed that was the case.

The Register interviewed Legion of Christ Father Thomas D. Williams, Dean of the School of Theology at Regina Apostolorum Pontifical University, regarding this issue.

What significance did Cardinal Arinze's comments have regarding Church discipline?

His Eminence merely reiterated Church teaching that one needs to be in a state of grace to receive holy Communion, and that a person who objectively finds himself in a situation of grave sin should not approach Communion. And the Cardinal added: “If the person should not receive it, then it should not be given.” There are cases where a person's public conduct stands in direct opposition to the faith and morals he supposedly adheres to, and unambiguously pro-abortion legislators fall into this category.

But doesn't this blur the distinction between the internal and external forums? How can the Church judge a person's subjective moral state?

Catholic theology holds that it is impossible to know with absolute assurance the state of another's soul. Nonetheless, the word “sin” has two dimensions, a subjective dimension and an objective one. Without going so far as to make a judgment on the subjective state of a person's soul, the Church may require that persons who persist in an objectively sinful action (grave matter) with no signs of repentance abstain from holy Communion.

By admonishing pro-abortion legislators to refrain from holy Communion, the bishop is informing them that their actions are objectively sinful and impede their full communion with the Church, which is expressed and confirmed by the reception of sacramental Communion. Once they are duly advised, if they fail to amend their conduct it can no longer be postulated that they act in good faith or out of ignorance.

What of the criticism that such a disciplinary measure “politicizes” the sacraments? Should the Church really intervene in politics in this way?

The decision to refuse Communion to a member of the congregation, regardless of the nature of that person's public wrongdoing, pertains only to the Church's internal sacramental discipline, and cannot be considered a political activity. Moreover, though politics, like other temporal affairs, enjoys a legitimate sphere of autonomy, it is not exempt from moral norms.

There is a moral dimension to politics just as there is a moral dimension to the economy, medicine, family life, and science. Christians cannot engage in business as if it were outside the realm of morality, any more than doctors can practice medicine without due regard for moral norms, and thus we have “business ethics” and “medical ethics” to help people of good will, and especially Christians, to live out these vocations according to the values and principles of the Gospel and right reason. “Political ethics” offers a no less important service to Christians who engage in public service for the good of society.

Catholic politicians can no more check their faith at the door of Congress than Catholic businesspeople can conduct their affairs independently of Christian moral principles.

The first and most basic human right is the right to life, such that a legislator who fails to defend this right defaults in his most fundamental responsibility as a public servant. “It is impossible to further the common good,” writes the Pope, “without acknowledging and defending the right to life, upon which all the other inalienable rights of individuals are founded and from which they develop” (Evangelium Vitae, No. 101).

Catholic morality requires a Catholic to actively defend the right to life. If a politician actively supports legislation that attacks the life of his citizens, in this case the most vulnerable and defenseless, he contravenes his most rudimentary moral norm to “do no harm” and sets himself up as an enemy of the society he is bound to protect.

But wouldn't such a measure just alienate people from the Church?

It is hard to gauge the full pastoral effects of denying Communion to pro-abortion politicians. Such a measure aims in the first place at the amendment of the person directly affected by the ban. One hopes that no longer being able to receive Communion would spur the party concerned to self-examination and a reweighing of his positions. If he truly values receiving the body and blood of the Lord in holy Communion, he will reflect well on his actions and their consequences for his own soul.

A second reason for refusing Communion to anti-life politicians relates to the bishop's prophetic role as witness and teacher of the faith. In the face of widespread moral uncertainty in contemporary society, fostered by what Pope John Paul has characterized as a “culture of death,” the bishop's teaching mission on behalf of life takes on a special relevance.

Though more ordinary teaching instruments such as homilies, articles and pastoral letters make up the vast majority of a bishop's pedagogical repertoire, the Church also offers her pastors more forceful didactic tools to be used in graver situations. When reason and exhortation fail to produce the intended results, disciplinary measures may be employed to illustrate the seriousness of what is at stake.

A step like refusing Communion to anti-life politicians sends an extremely clear message to Catholics regarding the evil of abortion, and its radical incompatibility with Christian morals.