RIGHT MOVE: KENNEDY REFUSED COMMUNION

J. Grant Swank, Jr.


Canon Law Regarding Catholics and Abortion:


"Canon Law 1398 Catholics who have obtained an abortion, or performed an abortion, have excommunicated themselves latae sententiae (automatically by their very action) from the Catholic Church. They remain outside the church until the reception of the sacrament of Penance through a good confession.


"Canon Law 1329 Catholics who are accomplices in enabling and permitting the crime of abortion to occur, who without their assistance the crime would not have been committed, incur the same penalty.


"Canon Law 915 (an exception to receiving Holy Communion) "Others who obstinately persist in manifest grave sin are not to be admitted to Holy Communion."


All bishops should follow their own Canon Law concerning their constituency and the abortion atrocity.


Roman Catholic Bishop Thomas Tobin sets the morally correct standard. He refused Patrick Kennedy the sacrament in Rhode Island.


Kennedy’s endorsement of child killing is abhorrent to God. It is abhorrent to the Roman Catholic ethical understanding of Scripture—the inerrant, infallible Word of God.


Kennedy favors killing womb infants. That is called “murder.” Female rights have no right to murder.


Therefore, the devil is in the process when mortals slay mortals who are in female bodies. That is not only how Tobin sees it; that is the way biblical believers understand divine revelation.


TV’s The View Whoopie Goldberg had a field day this morning when it came to her understanding of what the church does with its constituency’s views of right and wrong. With that, she went on her evangelistic diatribe about her understanding of Scripture.


She concludes that the Bible allows a human to do what he or she wants to do as long it is in keeping with that individual’s personal communication with God—no interference from churchly organizations or spiritual leaders.


On one part, she is accurate: a mortal can communicate with God and is served the consequences of that via accountability from that God.


But on the other part, she is so wrong. The God of the Bible does not have various moral codes for various persons depending on what they say they “hear” from God. God’s biblical standard is there as an eternal verity; it is not waffling to left or right, up or down.


Whoopie always has a good old time of it when trying to make deity out to be a Nice Guy on everything from communion altars to sex. In that she makes a lot of viewing friends for they likewise serve a deity who is totally into relativism, discounting absolutes.


However, Tobin is in line with the true understanding of Scripture when he holds the line on not permitting those who claim to be “Christian” yet murder to have Communion. They in no way have the ethical right to partake of the body and blood of Christ. That is atrocious in itself.


Think about it: Did Savior Christ suffer severe mistreatment on the cross in order to share His body and blood with persons who slay children? I don’t think so.


Did Christ stretch His holy presence on Calvary, permit nails to be driven through His hands and feet, then endure the spear slice in His side to allow pious appearing church goers the honor to partake of the sacrament representing that redemptive offering? I don’t think so.


Did Christ anywhere in His public ministry ever teach that slaughtering womb innocents is okay if it is not in a person’s life plan? I don’t think so.


Would to God that more clergy kept the same biblical standard that Tobin keeps. All spiritual leaders in the Christian tradition should obey God, His moral base and instruct those under their care to do the same.


"Sorry, you can't chalk it up to an 'imperfect humanity.' Your position is unacceptable to the Church and scandalous to many of our members,” Tobin told Kennedy.


Stay the holy course, Tobin. Stay the holy course.


FOOTNOTE:


The Bible speaks of a fetus as a person, not simply tissue that can be discarded if found to be a bother or nuisance. Since the fetus is a person from the moment of conception, then the destroying of the fetus is killing a person.


“In the past, some people have mistakenly speculated that perhaps the body might be in the process of formation for some time, and then 'God breathes a soul into it.' They had it backward. The life that is present forms matter into a body for itself'” (Joseph Breig, "Life Forms Matter," The Catholic News, Jan. 24, 1974, p. 8).


"Your hands shaped me and made me. Will you now turn and destroy me? Remember that you molded me like clay. Will you now turn me to dust again? Did you not pour me out like milk ... and knit me together with bones and sinews? You gave me life and showed me kindness, and in your providence watched over my spirit" (Job 10:8-12 NIV).


"Before I was born the LORD called me; from my birth he has made mention of my name...and now the LORD says--he who formed me in the womb to be his servant..." (Isaiah 49:1, 5).


"The word of the LORD came to me, saying, ‘Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations’" (Jeremiah 1:4-5).


In the following passages we note that personality is ascribed to the unborn.


"For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that fully well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be" (Psalm 139:13-16).


"Sons are a heritage from the LORD, children a reward from him" (Psalm 127:3).


Exodus 21:22-25 relates how Israel was to judge a circumstance relating to the death of the unborn:


"If men who are fighting hit a pregnant woman and she gives birth prematurely but there is no serious injury, the offender must be fined whatever the woman's husband demands and the court allows. But if there is serious injury, you are to take life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, wound for wound, bruise for bruise."


All of the latter deals with unintentional hurt that comes to a pregnant woman; how much more will divine penalty come upon those who intentionally discard the fetus? The Gospel of Luke ascribes personality to the fetus within Elizabeth:


"When Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, the baby leaped in her womb, and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit... As soon as the sound of your greeting reached my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy" (1:41, 44).


Mere tissue does not leap for joy; only personhood leaps for joy. The Bible regards the fetus as having personality. In Galatians, Paul speaks of himself as a person while still in his mother's womb, but more a person consecrated by God for a holy mission (compare Jeremiah 1:5 for the same accent):


"But when God, who set me apart from birth, and called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son in me so that I might preach him among the Gentiles..." (Gal. 1: 15-16).


Since the Bible regards the fetus as personality, then the aborting of the fetus is murdering personality.


Some verses from Scripture dealing with murder are then appropriate for study, such as Genesis 9:6: "Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made man." Also, read Exodus 23:7: "Have nothing to do with a false charge, and do not put an innocent or honest person to death, for I will not acquit the guilty." Note I Peter 4:15: "If you suffer, it should not be as a murderer..."


If the Republic returned to the biblical definition of personhood, we would defend every womb child.


John Adams said the following:


"Our Constitution was made only for a religious and moral people. It is wholly inadequate for the government of any other."


Andrew Jackson said the following:


"The BIBLE is the rock on which our Republic rests."


Daniel Webster:


"If we abide by the principles taught in the BIBLE, our country will go on prospering."


"For all the talk of freedom and self-determination, the abortion movement is at its heart a movement denying rights to a silent segment of humanity and soliciting public sanction, support and subsidy to its own cause" (Donald P. Shoemaker, ABORTION, THE BIBLE AND THE CHRISTIAN, Hayes Publishing Co., 1976, p. iv).