Pope Francis did not change Church teaching on the rules for receiving Communion, but rather assured people in difficult situations that the Church cares for them and the mercy of God extends to them, a Nigerian cardinal has said.
Speaking at Ghana’s National Eucharistic Congress in Jasikan, Cardinal John Onaiyekan of Abuja said it was unfortunate that pressure had mounted on the Church in some places to relax the rules on the reception of Holy Communion.
Such pressure, he said, can be seen in efforts to allow divorced and remarried Catholics to receive Communion without an annulment of their marriage or without abstaining from sexual relations with their new partners.
The age-old principles of the unity and indissolubility of marriage cannot be compromised to accommodate modern trends, he said.
“In a world going down the drain through widespread moral laxity, the Church of God cannot abdicate her responsibility to uphold the high standards of the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ,” Cardinal Onaiyekan told Catholics gathered for the congress.
Pope Francis’s apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia on the family clearly reaffirms the traditional doctrine of the Church, he said.
In the document’s final chapter, Pope Francis raised the issue of some Catholics in problematic situations, not as the norm but as exceptional cases, the cardinal said. The Pope spoke about those cases to encourage people who are in difficulty, and to assure them that the Church is aware of their burdens and struggles, and that no one is excluded from God’s mercy.
But the mercy of God does not replace or cancel the laws of God and the rules of the Church, the Nigerian cardinal said.
Participation in the Mass, even without receiving Communion, is not a futile exercise, Cardinal Onaiyekan said. In Catholic tradition, that participation is referred to as “spiritual communion”, and is an expression of faith that God find his way to anybody who is well disposed, whether or not that person is in a regular position to receive Communion.
“We must be thoroughly convinced that nobody is worthy to receive the Holy Eucharist,” the cardinal said. “It means, therefore, that whoever is in a position under the rules of the Church to approach the Holy Eucharist must do so with fear and trembling and with deep humility.”
Obey the Pontiff and accept your bishop, diocese told
Six nigerian bishops have appealed to priests, religious and laity of the Diocese of Ahiara to abide by a directive of Pope Francis and prepare for the installation of Bishop Peter Ebere Okpaleke.
The appeal came after an assembly of bishops from the Church’s Owerri province.
Nigerian Church leaders had met Pope Francis in June to discuss the situation of Bishop Okpaleke, who was appointed Bishop of Ahiara by Benedict XVI in 2012, but who has been unable to take control of the diocese because of protests, apparently by the majority of priests. On June 10, the Pope gave priests in the Ahiara diocese 30 days to write a letter promising obedience to him and accepting the appointed bishop or face suspension.
Fr Kingsley Anyanwu, editor of The Guide, the diocesan newspaper, said he could not confirm if priests had decided to heed the bishops’ appeal.
“All I know is that the priests are being respectful and showing their obedience to … Pope Francis,” he said. “We cannot disobey the Holy Father, and we are also praying that the will of God be done in Ahiara diocese. I cannot say that everybody [faithful as well as clergy] heeded the appeal.”
Pope prays for mudslide victims
Pope Francis has offered his prayers to the people of Sierra Leone after flooding and a major mudslide led to the deaths of hundreds of people and displaced thousands.
A message sent to Archbishop Edward Tamba Charles of Freetown said the Pope was “deeply saddened” by the disaster.
The message, sent by Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican Secretary of State, also expressed solidarity with rescue workers.
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