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THE HEAD OF the Roman Catholic Church in Philadelphia is closing the door opened by Pope Francis to letting civilly remarried Catholics receive Communion, saying the faithful in his archdiocese can only do so if they abstain from sex and live “as brother and sister.”
Archbishop Charles Chaput, who is known for strongly emphasising strict adherence to Catholic doctrine, issued a new set of pastoral guidelines for clergy and other leaders in the archdiocese that went into effect 1 July.
The guidelines reflect a stance taken by St John Paul II.
“Undertaking to live as brother and sister is necessary for the divorced and civilly remarried to receive reconciliation in the Sacrament of Penance, which could then open the way to the Eucharist,” the guidelines read.
‘The Joy of Love’
Church teaching says that unless divorced and remarried Catholics received an annulment — a church decree that their first marriage was invalid — they are committing adultery and cannot receive the sacrament of Communion.
Chaput says the new instructions stem from Francis’ sweeping document on family life released in April. That document — called “The Joy of Love” — opened a door to divorced and civilly remarried Catholics.
Francis didn’t create a church wide admission to Communion for divorced and civilly remarried Catholics as some progressives had wanted. But in the April document, he suggested bishops and priests could do so on a case-by-case basis in what could become a significant development in church practice.
Confusion
John Paul II, in his 1982 document on the family, proposed the brother-sister option for divorced and remarried couples as the only way they could receive Communion.
In Francis’ revision of that document, which conservatives like Chaput have criticised for sowing confusion, Francis made clear that John Paul’s proposal was simply unrealistic and unhealthy for families.
In a footnote to “The Joy of Love,” Francis wrote that many people, while acknowledging the brother-sister option, “point out that if certain expressions of intimacy are lacking, it often happens that faithfulness is endangered and the good of the children suffers.”
The Philadelphia guidelines say Catholics in same-sex partnerships, civilly remarried parishioners and unmarried couples living together should not be permitted to serve on parish councils, instruct the faithful, serve as lectors or dispense Communion.
Such “irregular” relationships “offer a serious counter-witness to Catholic belief, which can only produce moral confusion in the community,” the guidelines state, acknowledging it is a “hard teaching.”
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Sounds good, but please let these houses be earmarked for working taxpayers
@Newto2016:
Currently a housing estate being built in my town, 37 houses. All bought by the council for social housing.
2 new developments due to start shortly, all bought by respond.
We are locked out of the market even before it opens.
@Newto2016: they should go to the people that are on the waiting list longest. There are whole families living in B& B , Hotels etc There are 3,500 children homeless in this country. They deserve a home.
@Jurga Moylan: talk about ignorance you do know social housing is not to do with your employment status its to do with income, I am on a housing association committee and majority of tenants are working and paying tax, I’m surprised you didn’t me tion free houses while you were at it even though there is no such thing rent is income based not employment so yourself and newto2016 need to cop on to yourselves
@Jurga Moylan: do you already own a home ? Or are you in private renta? If you are in private rental you should be on the housing list. l , there are plenty of homes on the market for private buyers. It is the lack of social housing is the problem..
@nelliekel: who pays for the building of the house.
@Paul Buckley:
We are private renting, with sky high rents,our income is considered too high so we are not even considered for the social housing list.
We have 3 kids, the usual bills and the usual cost of living.
Trying to save 25 to 30k to buy a 2nd hand house is not exactly a walk in the park.
@nelliekel:
It’s not ignorance whatsoever, it’s my reality.
Paying big rent. Raising 3 kids, working full time, considered to be earning too much.
We could afford a house in one of those new developments but we don’t even get the chance to buy one. The help to buy scheme will give us the rest of the deposit we would need. BUT THE COUNCIL HAVE THEM ALL BOUGHT.
Bring that to your housing committee and see what you can work up for the likes of me and the thousands of others in the same predicament.
@Paul Buckley: “If you are in private rental you should be on the housing list” What world are you living in?
@Jurga Moylan: Spot on, its a nightmare at the moment for both sides of the coin. Under no circumstances should the council be allowed to buy a full development, it should be split.
@Jurga Moylan: so because council brought them you will blame others, at least you have some hope of owning House one day what if you were working full-time for minimum wage do you really think bank will give a mortgage,
@Mark: everyone is entitled to be on a local authority housing list…
@nelliekel:
Is this the way you go into your committee meetings, by reading into a narrative that hasn’t been implied? I’ve never blamed any one individual, I’ve mentioned the council in all my comments. I blame the council and the government for allowing this to happen.
Are u OK now hun?
@DeWitt:who pays for house you buy!!! Obviously if a mortgage the bank pays for it not you and you pay mortgage and until paid off they hold deeds, now incase you need it pointed out the council obviously pay for council house and collect rent on them but the tenants won’t ever own it unless they are allowed buy it of them at some stage and here’s a bit of info for you some tenants would have brought house twice over but banks aren’t to quick to give mortgage to someone on minimum wage,
@Paul Buckley:
That’s not correct.
Look it up!
@Jurga Moylan: the real problem is in your reply “sky high rents” Greedy people buying 4 / 5 homes there is one TD who owns 4 blocks of apartments and 5 homes.
And you should not be discriminated against because your income is too much.
Furthermore, I cannot understand how a standard house build in Ireland costs twice as much as it does in the UK.
I wish you well , I think everyone should get a fair crack of the whip.
@Paul Buckley:
To be fair to my landlord I think he’s just about breaking even with the rent I’m paying him. It’s more a long term investment rather than a quick buck. You’re right, everyone should get a fair crack but it’s all focused on the social housing at the moment.
@Newto2016: everyone in Ireland is a tax payer.
Unless you think we should discriminate against certain tax payers?
@nelliekel: the council uses the tax payers money.
@nelliekel: DCc is owed €35 million in back rent. Some of the tenants are not paying and the council cant evict them.
@Newto2016:
Agreed, social housing could be allocated to all workers, with rent based on income. So your tax helps you (and others).
Only less than 5% of the population were unemployed before covid, there’s way more than 5% who live in social housing. So many in social housing had a job.
@Barry: if you get your income from social welfare and you pay VAT on goods, you just give the government back some of their own money. Income tax, corporate tax, etc are a net loss to the individual.
@Barry: actually we should
@DeWitt:
How much rent arrears is owed in the Private Renting sector?
How much mortgage arrears in the Home Ownership sector?
So we can compare these rent arrears with the social housing sector.
I expected a 1st world capitalist country to have eliminated homelessness.
@nelliekel: just wow
@DeWitt: don’t know were you get information from but council can evict someone for none payment of rent and do, and who’s money do you think bank uses to give mortgage
@Jurga Moylan: number one I’m not your Hun.. I agree everyone should have right to affordable housing but as long as our government allows vulture funds to buy up property and charge high rents fewer people will be able to buy houses, I’d rather see council buy them to house people then American and Chinese vulture funds, to get a mortgage now is beyond a joke my neice a nurse and her husband a Doctor had terrible trouble getting approved because he worked in two different hospitals in two years and they told them couldn’t guarantee income??? Another nephew and partner were refused twice even both in steady jobs while his brother an apprentice had no problem all of then ended up using a broker to get them one so I am well aware of the problems and to expect people to have savings of €20or €30 grand savings a joke while paying high rent but the content bitching I see about people getting free!!! Houses is getting beyond a joke, councils should be building houses instead of selling land then paying above market value for houses of the developers they sold land to shows how fe*led up country is,
@nelliekel: the problem of housing whether private or social originates in government policies protecting banks and profits. How many times have we read about the corrupt practices in NAMA? ALL the properties that have been sold to vultures should have been sold to the Irish private market and councils.
@nelliekel: Total nonsense. The rents they pay on a €400,000 house are nominal to the point its basically a free house. And no way would they pay for the house twice over, total ballox. And there should never, ever be the option to buy social housing after playing basically free rent for a few years. Totally and utterly unfair to tax payers struggling with mortgages that some scrote can just get €400k equity for nothing
@Dean: how much tax are you willing to pay off your earnings to make that happen?
@Jurga Moyla Where did Respong get the finances to buy up this housing stock?
@Newto2016: what have you got against unemployed taxpayers??
So 22% is the increased PLEDGE from this year. So this year we should have 7786 houses built but we have only 700 so 9% complete to target so far. Good luck believing this.
@Deirdre O C: TBF, this year is particularly challenging
@Cian – Wash your: I know, i get it however my problem is him parading out this 22% as a good thing when we only are 9% this year. It’s not an increase if we fail to deliver the target in the first place.
Surprised Leo didn’t make this wonderful announcement, he usually blathers on about mythical things in the future, while having convenient amnesia abut the previous announcements.
@Da_Dell: How much does Leo charge you for renting or cost renting that space in your head. You are obsessed.
More waffle from this egotist.
@Paul Mc:* egoist
Great, so can all renters expect to knock 30% off the rent, or home buyers off the mortgage?
This social housing construct is obviously lopsided in favour of a non contributory cohort of population,who benefit from modern top rate housing on a needs assessment, subsidised by taxpayers who cannot access their own housing.
Some rebalancing is needed to maintain some semblance of republican Egalite in this matter.
@William Kelly: I agree it should be allocated to workers only to stop this welfare dependence. However we need to massively expand the scheme to house workers. We have a huge working poor problem in Ireland. People who work in cafes sleep in dormitories.
Market values are distorted as it is! Many landlords are leaving property deliberately empty rather than rent them out cheaper! We desperately needed a Vacant Property Tax in yesterdays budget
Here’s an amazing thing but 80% of civil service entrants are entitled to social housing. Seriously you should check out your elugability
I am in my 6th year on housing list and despite applying for many houses on a weekly basis I cannot fee see me obtaining a house .
@Mary Mc Carthy: Upskill & work your way off that list. Much easier than applying every week for a hand out.
@Melissa Mahony: I unskilled and now have a gross of 70000 and a family 2+2, I am excluded from this list and I am excluded from a mortgage unless it’s very affordable Sligo or Donegal. Why can’t I live where I was born or at least 50 miles of it.
This notion of up-skilling is nonsense.
I completed university 3 times (up-skilled after my degree after the recession), and I still don’t earn enough to get a mortgage from a bank. The prices of private renting equals a large chunk of my wages.
And despite my education & years of work experience, I still get employers offering salaries as low as possible (they’d rather hire cheap from across Europe).
have your say