The Most Equivocal Man In Town
On KCBS Radio in San Francisco (Feb. 4) there was a half-hour interview with Archbishop George Niederauer of San Francisco (transcript courtesy of www.Calcatholic.com, Feb. 9). There were two interviewers, Ed Cavagnaro and Rebecca Corral.
Cavagnaro: “Is there room for disagreement with Church doctrine by Catholics in your view? For example, can someone believe in a woman’s right to choose to have an abortion….”
Niederauer: “The Church is a very forgiving and very loving institution and hangs in with people all their lives long…. Unity may not be uniformity but I think we have to say that there is a teaching of the Church on abortion…and it may be that there are those who struggle with that teaching. But, we cannot say, well, you can believe anything you want.”
Corral: “But what does that mean?” (Indeed.)
Niederauer: “I would ask for a kind of dialog, an exchange, in which there would be an openness to understanding where the person — other person — is coming from, but also an openness on their part to the longstanding tradition of the Church…. So I think — I think — the dialog is what’s important, that we don’t just write each other off and walk away.”
Corral: “If you’re still having the conversation, and the Catholic believes a certain principle in her own heart, the dialog is still ongoing, what does it mean, where does it go? Can you still get Communion?”
Niederauer: “I…am counting on the individual communicant who’s coming forward to receive Communion to decide whether he or she is worthy of Communion…. I am not there principally as a gatekeeper. I am there as a priest and a celebrant to give forth the Eucharist.”
You May Also Enjoy
One of the prime characteristics of the Church in our time is an almost complete absence of discipline, even in dioceses led by good bishops.
Here we present samples of offerings in the Narthex, the NOR’s online blog.
The chief rabbi of Poland said that while "there's not a silence" about the persecution of Christians around the world, "there is not enough yelling and screaming."