Kasper describes how ‘penitential pathway’ might work in practice

IN A NINE-PAGE essay in the German theological monthly Stimmen der Zeit, Cardinal Walter Kasper attempts to demonstrate how it would be possible theologically to allow remarried divorcees to receive the Eucharist under tightly defined conditions, writes Christa Pongratz-Lippitt.

There could never be a general solution to the “thorny and complex” problem, Cardinal Kasper argues. Each case would have to be considered individually, to ascertain full repentance of sin. Remarried divorcees would undertake a “painful but salutary process of clarification and reorientation with a confessor”, Kasper suggests. Meanwhile Cardinal Angelo Scola of Milan has described how his archdiocese has created an office for separated Catholics, where they will be able to talk through their circumstances and be offered guidance on suitable courses of action.