Twice-Divorced, Pro-Abort Rudy Giuliani Receives Communion at Papal Mass
Thank God this guy isn't the GOP nominee:
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Twice-divorced former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani took Communion at a Mass celebrated by Pope Benedict on Saturday, breaching rules that bar those who remarry outside the Church from doing so.
As he left New York's St. Patrick's Cathedral with his third wife, Judith, the failed presidential candidate confirmed to Reuters that he took Communion from a priest.
Asked if he was uncomfortable with having broken the Church ban on the divorced and remarried taking Communion, Giuliani said, "No."
***
Despite his Catholic faith, Giuliani has espoused socially liberal political positions such as backing a woman's right to choose an abortion and supporting gay rights.
[More]
Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
Pro-Abort Catholic Politicians to Receive Communion at Papal Mass [UPDATED]
Labels: Blessed Sacrament, Dissident Catholics, Marriage, Mass, Pope, Pro-Life, Republicans, RINOs, Rudy
posted by Pro Ecclesia 3:30 PM
8 comments
8 Comments:
It also shows what a calculating jerk he is. During his run he was not receiving Communion when he went to Mass. I guess he did not want a John Kerry spotlight on him, but now he doesn't care.
This will sound terribly uncharitable, self-absorbed, judgmental and all sorts of other bad things, but there are times when you just have to rant and even say things you only half-mean ...
Giuliani's attitude is contemptible, revolting, depressing. I hope that he's eaten his own damnation and burns in hell over this. It's the only logical thing left. How can a man be so utterly blithe about Communion -- and that's a very separate question from the moralities of abortion and remarriage, and the details of canon law.
If Giuliani were a Protestant talking of a memorial of crackers and juice or, more-generally, some picayune issue of protocol -- I could understand (if not necessarily respect) a rule-breaker, since such rules aren't such a big deal.
If Giuliani could plausibly plead ignorance of the rules or if the rules were unclear, in themselves or in their application to his case -- I could understand (if not necessarily respect) a rule-breaker, since judgment of cases is inexact and others will not know all the facts.
If Giuliani were merely publicly disagreeing with some churchman on some theological or moral issue -- I could understand (if not necessarily respect) ignoring the churchman, since many do in fact say wrong things.
But to blithely say "no" when asked whether he's comfortable breaking the rules about the Body and Blood of Christ -- it boggles my mind. And my mind can understand a lot of really bad things, at least an abstract level (e.g., I think most felonies are perfectly explicable, in fact almost boringly straightforward). I realize not everybody knows Flannery O'Connor's "if it's just a symbol, to hell with it" line or thinks profound the line from the Clockwork Orange prison guard: "show some reverence, you bastards." But what the colorful is the point of going to Mass at all if that's the attitude you take?
This is something I take unusually personally. On a majority of Sundays I stay in the pew during Communion because of my weaknesses and stumbles on matters of sex. And as excruciating as the Communion Rite is in those circumstances, I can truthfully say that never has taking Communion when out of communion even seriously occurred to me (much less been done by me). At the most recent Easter Vigil, I spent much of the Communion Rite in silent depression-filled tears as I sat in one of the most gorgeous churches in DC and seemingly every other person in the cavernous EWTN-broadcast-fit chapel was going up. I couldn't avoid the thought "I really don't think I'm the only person in this building with an unconfessed chicken-choke or porno peek on his conscience, and I really don't want to think I'm the only person in that subset who takes Communion rules seriously." And this is experience talking, the mind will then quickly (and immorally) move from that to such thoughts as "why bother," "this is just a big charade that nobody believes," and sometimes worse.
Again to be clear -- Giuliani can have his multiple marriages and pro-choice stance (at least for the purposes of the point I'm making). But by neither sitting in the pew nor leaving the church in response to these two things -- he's a gutless wuss, unwilling to live out the consequences of his actions and take his convictions to their conclusions if there's the slightest inconvenience involved. And what can he possibly think he's gaining from the Eucharist on these terms?
Thank you, CM.
Courageman:
Mr. Guiliani is not my favorite character and yes he has done some bad things and does not stand for many of the same ideals that we do. Furthermore, he was wrong to take communion. However, we should not wish him to Hell. It would be better that we pray for him to turn from his evil ways.
While few of us have done the kind of things he has, none of us are perfect either.
OHIO JOE
Although I am sick to my stomach with Rudy, Pelosi and Kerry - I'm with Joe on this one. Don't wish hell on anyone.
I pray he repents and God mercifully receives him into Heaven. I pray God has mercy on me too (it will take just as much mercy and grace to get me into heaven as it takes to get Rudy there).
God have mercy on us sinners.
I think Courage Man, as he indicates at the beginning of his post, is just venting. Knowing what I know about Courage Man, I highly doubt he wishes Hell on anyone.
But I can understand the frustrations of a SSA man struggling to remain chaste out of faithfulness and obedience to Christ and His Church (and absenting himself from Communion on those occasions where he stumbles), as he watches Giuliani so blithely announce that he has no qualms about violating the norms respecting the most important aspect of our Faith.
What Giuliani has done - and the attitude with which he had done it - is certainly damnable.
The first paragraph all y'all read was actually the last one I wrote, after rereading a draft of the post, which I wrote straight through in full "rant-and-vent" mode.
Jay reads me correctly, but in the interests of saying it myself: Seriously wishing Hell on another man is itself damnable. We all should want -- first, last and most -- conversion from public figures, and want their actions in public matters to be consonant with that. I had hoped my earlier first graf put some distance between what I acknowledge as the truth that the Church teaches and the emotional reaction that the rest of that note was.
But as I said in that first graf, you sometimes want to say things you only half-mean, and I decided it was more important that the rant I had written accurately reflect my (I acknowledge) overheated and rationally-indefensible reaction to stuff like Giuliani's nonchalance about what he is objectively doing -- eating and drinking his own damnation.
Do you people think that the Catholic Church really cares?
It accepts my wife and her lover openly and they are unrepentant adulterers. It does not even matter that twice the Rota upheld our valid marriage. The lover was openly accepted for RCIA and into the Catholic Church as he impregnated my wife twice, so they could use those children as the reason to justify their adultery and remaining together "for the good of the children". What a crock of crap!
Now all is fine and dandy with the Catholic Church.
It is a Church of falsehood and lies. I finally left it formally and this visit from the Pope made me ever more sure of that painful decision.
The Catholic Church "writes off" abandoned spouses and "ministers" to those who continue their persecution, from the "loving arms of Mother Church".
It gladly accepts public adulterers, no matter what destruction they continue to do or scandal they cause.
I will return to the Catholic Church when it wakes up and sees what its pastoral practices and annulment mills are really about.
Till then, may God have mercy on my soul and those the Church is unjustly destroying. We are many.
Karl
Post a Comment
<< Home