Bishop Martino: "I cannot have [the] Vice President-elect coming to Scranton, saying he learned his values there"

(Hat tip: Dave Hartline at The Catholic Report)

Rocco Palmo writes about the USCCB meetings in Baltimore at Whispers in the Loggia:

In the public session, this past campaign cycle's most-forthright hierarchical voice said that his confreres would one day have to deal with their collective "reticence" on the question of Catholic politicians who support abortion rights in defiance of church teaching.

The history of the church's response to racism, Bishop Joseph Martino of Scranton noted in a debate intervention (his second so far), would not be seen in the light it were today had Archbishops Joseph Rummel of New Orleans and Joseph Ritter of St Louis (later a cardinal) not imposed ecclesiastical sanctions on defiant public officials during the civil rights movement.

In this meeting's first public reference to Joe Biden, Martino said that he "cannot have a Vice President-elect coming to Scranton, saying he learned his values there, when those values are utterly opposed to the teaching of the church."

At the outset, Martino acknowledged that his comments might not be the most desired in the room... but even so, they came in his usual fluid, quick, forceful cadence.

Asked after the debate how the morning's executive session went, one prelate from the big center said "You just heard it." Several others later confirmed the impression.

(emphasis added)

Vice President Biden attends Mass, Bishop John H Ricard advises examination of conscience

A Florida bishop is urging Vice President-elect Joseph Biden to examine his conscience before receiving holy Communion in light of his public support of keeping abortion legal. Catholic News Service reports:

Saying he was writing with a sense of "urgency," Bishop John H. Ricard of Pensacola-Tallahassee, Fla., sent a letter Nov. 4 to Biden stating his views on worshipping at Mass and the reception of Communion. The letter was posted on the diocesan Web site two days after Biden attended Mass Nov. 2 at the Co-Cathedral of St. Thomas More in Tallahassee. The vice president-elect was in Florida on a final campaign swing through the state.

At no point in the letter did the bishop bar the vice president-elect from receiving Communion in the diocese, instead seeming to leave the decision to Biden.

A spokesman for Biden said in an e-mail message to Catholic News Service that the vice president-elect would have no comment.

The full text of Bishop Ricard's letter is posted online. An excerpt:

Our worship of God during Sunday Mass, which culminates in the reception of Holy Communion, is precisely the moment when we are nourished and strengthened by the Holy Spirit’s gift of courage to stand up in fortitude to protect the weakest among us. The Eucharist, as the real presence of Christ, is also the sign of our unity as a Church, which is built on sharing in the mission of Christ to protect the defenseless. While grateful for the effective collaboration you and your office have offered on so many worthy projects and concerns, I also observe, by your support for laws that fail to protect the unborn, a profound disconnection from your human and personal obligation to protect the weakest and most innocent among us: the child in the womb.

As the bishops said in their 2004 reflection on Catholics in Public Life, “The Eucharist is the source and summit of Catholic life. Therefore, like every Catholic generation before us, we must be guided by the words of St. Paul, ‘Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the Body and Blood of the Lord’ (1 Cor 11:27). This means that all must examine their consciences as to their worthiness to receive the Body and Blood of our Lord. This examination includes fidelity to the moral teaching of the Church in personal and public life. .

Respect for the Holy Eucharist, in particular, demands that it be received worthily and that it be seen as the source for our common mission in the world.”

I pray that the Catholic faith you have been raised in, the faith by which you pray, and the life of virtue which flows from both may strengthen you so that you may have the strength needed to witness Jesus, even as the martyrs did, and live by the virtue of fortitude as you proclaim your support to the Person of Christ in the most vulnerable of his members: the pre-born child. You are, Senator, always welcome to nourish such a faith within the Diocese of Pensacola-Tallahassee.

Our First Catholic Vice President (and an embarassment, at that)

Commonweal celebrates our very first Catholic vice president:

Of course, John F. Kennedy blazed the trail for Catholics. But it has taken nearly 50 years for another Catholic to follow him to victory on a national ticket. This time, the issue was not whether the candidate would adhere too closely to the dictates of the Catholic hierarchy. More like the opposite: Biden had to weather some serious criticism from bishops about his views on abortion (and his bad theology on the subject).

Biden’s home town, Scranton, Pa., became a national emblem of the fight for Catholic votes. Scranton’s bishop, Joseph Martino, said he would deny the Eucharist to Biden and took many other steps to condemn not only the Obama-Biden ticket but Catholics who supported it. Lackawanna County went to the Democratic ticket, 62 percent to 36 percent - the bishop’s effort to sway voters failed. In Lackawanna County, as in the nation, a majority of Catholics supported the Obama-Biden ticket.

Personally, I find it downright embarassing that the only Catholic the American people could muster for Vice President is one who demonstrated his complete theological and moral incoherence on television and was in turn publicly chastised by the Bishops of the United States.

Too bad we couldn't have done better.