Archive for August, 2004
Decision to Take Communion One of Integrity
Monday, August 9th, 2004
“The Charlotte Observer”
By Jeffrey Kirby
Special to the Observer
Last week the archbishop of Atlanta and the bishops of Charleston and Charlotte issued a pastoral statement on Catholic politicians and the reception of Holy Communion. The recent meeting of American bishops in Denver left it to local bishops to decide the best approach on this issue for their own diocese.
Bishop Peter Jugis of Charlotte, Bishop Robert Baker of Charleston and Archbishop John Donoghue of Atlanta have chosen to deny Holy Communion to pro-abortion politicians. Their statement also encourages all Catholics to refrain from the sacrament if they are in grave sin. The bishop’s statement takes center stage in the Carolinas, as John Kerry’s run for the presidency includes a North Carolinian running mate as well as possible visits to the Carolinas.
The bishop’s statement and the overall situation between Kerry and the Catholic hierarchy might appear an unimportant religious issue to many politically minded people. Others may view it solely as an internal dilemma within the Catholic Church. Either position, however, allows for inattention to the underlying moral issue – integrity.
Whether a person is Catholic, Protestant or nonreligious, the conversation concerning Kerry and Holy Communion should bring one question to mind: “Does John Kerry have the integrity to be the president of the United States?”
The importance of integrity cannot be overemphasized in a democracy where the entire governmental structure and judicial process depends on truth. We have already experienced the scandal in the Oval Office of a man who says one thing and does another. The Catholic Church itself, in its own recent crises, has re-awakened to a deeper understanding of the importance of truthfulness in leadership positions.
Kerry is freely associating himself with the Catholic Church, a church which is doctrinally and visibly a defender of unborn life. The senator claims that he is a practicing Catholic “in good standing,” while also supporting abortion legislation.
The leadership of the Catholic Church in the Atlanta province is informing Kerry and other pro-abortion Catholic politicians that their views are at odds with the church’s formal teachings. It is asking Kerry and others for integrity. They should either change their views or refrain from certain practices, such as receiving Holy Communion. This change of practice would provide a time of personal discernment for Kerry and others, while showing society his difference of opinion. It is an invitation to and insistence on integrity.
Not only Catholic America, but also Protestant and nonreligious America, even if they are uninterested in the specifics of this “Catholic” debate, should be concerned with the matter of integrity which is at the heart of these circumstances. It would be a mistake to allow a man who knowingly misrepresents himself to become a public official.
Kerry and others are asked to act according to what they claim to believe. Nothing less and nothing more. It is ultimately a question of integrity.
Jeff Kirby, of Hopkins, S.C., is a Catholic seminarian for the Diocese of Charleston, studying at the Pontifical North American College in Rome.
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