CDF spells out policy on access to Communion

The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF), writing after last month’s Synod on the Family, has stated that church laws on Communion for divorced and remarried Catholics remain in force, writes Tom Heneghan. CDF Secretary Archbishop Luis Ladaria Ferrer responded to a written query by an unnamed French priest about whether he could absolve them.

The secretary said confessors must assess each case according to three criteria. They must determine whether the first marriages were sacramentally valid and whether the couple could separate and reconcile with earlier spouses. If that is not possible, a confessor should then ask the couple to live like “brother and sister”.

“One cannot validly absolve a divorced and remarried person who does not firmly resolve to not ‘sin in future’,” the archbishop wrote.