Relator General recalls situation of discussion - Church is called to "mercifully accompany" divorced and remarried," but also "to witness consistently" to Catholic doctrine
Vatican City (kath.net/KAP) The Relator General Synod of Bishops, Cardinal Peter Erdo (Esztergom-Budapest) has made it clear on Monday in the Vatican, that he defends the indissolubility of marriage and the current teaching of the Church. The majority of the Synod participants from 2014 have shared the view that remarriage after the failure of a bond formed by the Church is contrary to the message of Jesus Christ and excludes those affected from receiving Communion, he said in his opening speech. Erdo referred in his remarks to the working document (Instrumentum Laboris) from the Synod. This is based on the Extraordinary Synod from October 2014.
The Church is called pastorally "to mercifully accompany" the divorced and remarried, but "to witness consistently" at the same time the Catholic doctrine, said the Primate of Hungary. To accomplish this, however, deeper reflection it needed a deeper reflection, Erdo conceded looking forward to the forthcoming three-week deliberations of the bishops.
As General Relator, Erdo is the correspondent of the Episcopal Assembly and has important influence on the formulation of the synod results. He pointed out that there are many ways for the divorced and remarried to share in community life, without allowing for the Eucharist. Erdö was critical about the ways of the Orthodox Churches that permit remarriage after a divorce under certain guidelines. These practices are not comparable with the case law based of the Catholic Church.
Erdö also rejected the idea of "gradualism" in the assessment of sexual relations outside of marriage. Objectively between true and false, and between good and evil, there is no gradualness, he stressed. However, there might be for the individual a subjective, gradual approach to good and truth. The subjective fault is less serious if the sin is not recognized.
On the subject of homosexuality Erdo recalled the existing Church doctrine, according to which there are "not even distant analogies or similarities" between homosexual partnerships and God's plan for marriage and family. Copyright 2015 Catholic press agency Kathpress, Vienna, Austria VIDEO from lecture: (C) 2015 Catholic News Agency KNA GmbH.All rights reserved.
Trans: Tancred vekron99@hotmail.com
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