Eucharist Not Just a Symbol

In front of St. Patrick's Cathedral, Chris Slattery held a press conference and fired the first salvo in the escalating war between faith and secularism. Holding up signs addressed to Edward Cardinal Egan, Mr. Slattery told reporters that the press conference was one of 17 simultaneous conferences being held throughout the country. "Please end the Kerry scandal," was the title of the press release handed out to members of the press, essentially a plea to bishops to enforce some discipline over pro-choice politicians who flout church teaching while claiming communion with the church. Mr. Slattery alleges the American bishops' refusal to admonish the more than 500 Catholic politicians who are unrepentantly pro-choice or for gay marriage sends a false signal to lay Catholics and misrepresents church teachings on moral issues. I asked Mr. Slattery how he would address the question of separation of church and state. He said the issue of whether to deny the Eucharist to wayward public Catholics is a matter of internal church affairs that may have public ramifications, but the church has to maintain its central integrity by disciplining members who commit grave scandal by their political positions while asserting an identity with the church. Pope John Paul II has made it clear, Mr. Slattery said, the Eucharist is only for those in communion with the church, and American bishops have been lax in upholding its teachings. Catholic politicians, he said, like John Kerry, George Pataki, Rudy Giuliani, Ted Kennedy, Tom Daschle, and Dick Gephardt, should not be receiving Communion while they maintain positions contrary to the Roman Catholic Church. "They are certainly free to hold whatever opinions they choose, but to pretend that they are Catholics in good standing is hypocritical," he said. "The U.S. bishops have rewarded pro-choice politicians like John Kerry by allowing them to use their church attendance as photo ops. They are using the church as a tool to get elected and that is blasphemous." For Catholics, the Eucharist is not merely symbolic. We believe it is the presence of Jesus Christ, His Body and Blood, and to receive it one must be in communion with the church and its teachings. All Catholics know this and the honorable Catholic politicians who are in dissent with the church over certain issues voluntarily refrain from receiving public Communion. One Washington politician, Rep. Henry Hyde, agrees with Mr. Slattery that Catholic bishops have skirted the issue. In an interview with Thomas Roeser of the Chicago Sun-Times, he said, "I am greatly disappointed with the failure of much of the church hierarchy to take an unequivocal stand on abortion." Mr. Slattery is the director and founder of Expectant Mothercare, a nonprofit organization that provides assistance for girls and women in crisis pregnancies with medical counseling for alternatives to abortion. Expectant Mothercare has several clinics serving the New York area that provide free ultrasound exams and referrals for prenatal care. The current Time magazine issue has an article entitled "Kerry's Catholic dilemma," but perhaps a more accurate headline should be the U.S. Catholic Church has a problem. For 30 years it has skirted around the issue of how to advise Catholics on such polarizing issues as abortion, gay rights, euthanasia, racism, and anti-Semitism. The recent church scandals have also made the bishops wary of entering a public political battle. Theodore Cardinal McCarrick has been on network television several times addressing this issue. Denying the Eucharist is a last resort, he has said that this is an issue that should be between that person and his pastor. He does not want a confrontation at the altar. Rep. Hyde asks, "Where better to have a confrontation?" The Communion rail has become a battleground for activists determined to confront church authority. Catholic gays are walking up the church aisle to receive the Eucharist wearing rainbow sashes in support of gay rights and challenging priests to deny them Communion. While the Times article seems to assert that challenging Kerry's Catholicism may backfire on his critics, this may be a liberal's wishful thinking. When I say that the first salvo has been fired, I mean that many Americans are finally awakening to the fact that there is an ongoing cultural war by secularists on their faith and they may begin to fight. The Supreme Court allowed the words "under God" to continue in the Pledge of Allegiance, but only due to a technicality. Los Angeles caved in to the ACLU's threat of a suit and agreed to remove the cross on the city seal. Of course, the ACLU had no problem with the Goddess Pomona on the same seal. Paganism, yes. Christianity, no. Has the ACLU noticed that all our money contains the words "In God We Trust?" Catholics demanding that their bishops obey the pope may be just the beginning. This week, the Southern Baptist convention voted to sever its ties with the Baptist World Alliance because of complaints that the global association had adopted liberal theology and an anti-American agenda. This convention is the largest Protestant body in the nation with 16.3 million members. That, my friends, is an awful lot of votes.