Public Sin and the Reception of Holy Communion

Excerpted from a homily posted on the Wanderer:

We have bishops and priests now who refuse to deny the Eucharist to people who are in public sin. They (the people) refuse to make the distinction between private and public. For instance, if I knew that one of you was living a sinful life and you came up to the communion rail, I would have to give you Holy Communion because, number one, I do not know if you have been to Confession; or even if I know that you had not, to deny you Holy Communion would cause a scandal because it would draw the attention to other people that what you are doing privately is now being made public.

So unless I talk to you first and tell you, “If you come up to Communion, I will not give you Holy Communion,” the Church says that even though it is a sacrilege on your part to receive Holy Communion if you are in the state of mortal sin, I would still have to give you Communion.

However, if one is a politician who has a public record of being pro-abortion, pro-euthanasia, pro-human-cloning, if there is some other public exposition of your sin, like these unfortunate souls who show up all over the place with rainbow sashes telling people that they are practicing a homosexual lifestyle and demanding that they receive Holy Communion, at that point, it is a sacrilege on the part of the priest to give them Holy Communion because their sin is no longer private – it is now public.

But there are many who do not want to cause waves, and so they refuse to stand up for Jesus; instead, being politically correct is what is more important.

When it came to things that were wrong, Jesus Christ did not remain silent. He taught the truth; He did not wimp out. He did not water it down; He told people exactly what was going to happen to them if they did not change their lives.

...they (Jesus and the Apostles) continued to preach the truth right up to the point when they were thrown out of town. Would that we had priests and bishops today who would do the same.

We have to make sure that we are following the right shepherd.

We have a Good Shepherd, and none of us is going to be able to stand before the Lord and say, “But Father said it was okay. The bishop didn’t do anything about it, so it must have been okay.” The Lord will look at you and say, “I’ll deal with that priest or that bishop when they get here. You, on the other hand, knew better, and I’m going to hold you responsible for what you knew.” We know the truth. It is written in our hearts and on our minds; we are without excuse.

Great homily...Link here