Why did Cardinal Vincent Nichols scold the group of nearly 500 priests who signed a letter declaring their fidelity to the Church’s teaching, rather than answering them in more detail? He told them sternly that the discussions they ought to be having with their bishops, prior to this autumn’s international synod in Rome, “are not best conducted through the press”. My guess would be that picking on the issue of publicity enabled him to convey to them his reservations about the substance of what they were saying, but he did not want to have that sort of argument with them in public. The fact is, though, that the synod may well not come to the conclusions the signatories want. They are demanding that it reaffirms the strict rule that a divorced Catholic who remarries
01 April 2015, The Tablet
Conservative clergy, armed with theology textbooks, have little to offer families
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User Comments (1)
Clifford Longley’s logic of the consequences of adherence to Christ’s own doctrine of the indissolubility of marriage, is not only not certain or Christian, but an improbable representation of “these conservative clergy”, who may be more confident of the power of God’s grace in desparate situations than he seems to be, and more prepared to acknowledge that Christ’s “burden”, though “light”, is only so after one has “shouldered” it, and also involves the daily carrying of one’s own cross, made the heavier by any failure to observe Christ’s commandments. To Christ’s question to his Apostles, while many other disciples were giving up on Him,“are you going to walk away too?” these clergy” might be readier than less conservative clergy, to answer “to whom would we go?”