VATICAN (CWNews.com)

    The president of the Pontifical Council for the Interpretation of Legislative Texts has disclosed that the Vatican issued a new statement on the status of Catholics who are divorced and remarried because there is "a great deal of confusion on the subject."

    Archbishop Julian Herranz, whose Council reaffirmed the teaching that divorced and remarried Catholics should not receive the Eucharist, told the Roman news agency I Media that the new statement was required because some Catholics had "badly interpreted" a particular article in Canon Law. He referred to Canon 915, which stipulates that Catholics "who obstinately persist in grave sin, should not be admitted to Holy Communion."

    Because of the widespread confusion over whether or not that law pertained to divorced and remarried Catholics, the archbishop explained, the Pontifical Council concluded that the proper interpretation of the law should be laid out "in juridical terms, according to our competence."

    Archbishop Herranz observed that the confusion over the status of divorced and remarried Catholics included the widespread impression that these people are excommunicated. They are not, he said. He continued: "We must distinguish between those who are outside the Church, because they are excommunicated, and those who-- as with those who are divorced and remarried-- remain sons of the Church, and are invited to participate at Mass, and to take part in parish activities, even if they cannot receive Communion.

    The archbishop said that there are two reasons for the prohibition against Communion for those who are divorced and remarried. The first is the imperative to preserve the integrity of the Eucharist, by excluding those who are in a state of sin. The second is to uphold the Church's firm teaching that marriage is indissoluble. The Church cannot accept remarriage, he reasoned, without accepting the notion that a first marriage can be dissolved.

    "It is not that the Church has no mercy" toward those who are divorced and remarried, Archbishop Herranz declared. Rather, the Church follows the example of Christ, "who pardons the adulterous woman in the Gospel, and tells her, 'Go and sin no more.' Christ does not justify adultery, even as he pardons this woman."

    By the same token, the archbishop concluded, the Church cannot justify remarriage for Catholics who are, in the eyes of God and of the Church, already engaged in a Christian marriage to another spouse. Archbishop Herranz cautioned against the belief that "if a majority of people think that the truth does not apply, then that truth no longer exists." In the end, he said, "But a law that comes from God can not be changed."

    For the full text, see MITERS THAT MATTER: ROME RESPONDS

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