Who is the guardian of the sacraments?
Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone of San Francisco said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi should not present her self for Communion because of her uncompromising political support of unregulated abortion. Ms. Pelosi ignored her bishop’s admonition and immediately took communion in Washington D.C. which raises the question: who is the guardian of the sacraments?
Ms. Pelosi thinks she knows best, as you can see in the video above, presenting a straw man argument in her defense:
“I wonder about the death penalty, which I am opposed to. So is the church. But they take no action against those who oppose their view.”
Only 11 people executed in the U.S. last year
For the record, the Catholic Church accepted the death penalty as a just form of punishment for capital offenses until 2018.
For the record, no one in Pelosi’s state of California is even calling for a reinstatement of the death penalty.
And for the record, Ms. Pelosi fails to recognize the innocence of the human person in the womb, 800,000 of whom were ‘executed’ (aborted) for the crime of being inconvenient in contrast to the 11 people who were executed in the U.S. last year for the crime of murder.
Does Pelosi not understand the difference between hundreds of thousand innocent deaths and 11 just punishments? Of course she does, which is why she uses capital punishment as a straw man argument, which the dictionary defines thusly:
“A straw man intentionally misrepresents a proposition that is set up because it is easier to defeat than an opponent’s real argument.”
Ms. Pelosi uses capital punishment as a weapon to deflect answering the real argument her Church has with abortion: that it kills innocent human beings.
So who is the best guardian of the sacraments?
Catholics are split on whether Archbishops should ever deny communion to members of their flock. But most would agree that an Archbishop Cordileone is a better guardian of the sacraments than a pro-abortion politician (or even a Whoopi Goldberg, whom you can watch blather on about the subject in the clip above).
Archbishop Cordileone spent seven years in Rome as a member of the Church’s equivalent of their Supreme Court, the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signature. He knows canon law, and clearly expressed his concerns to Ms. Pelosi:
“It is souls that are at stake, not elections. Lost sheep are to be lovingly called to return to the fold, not angrily denounced in the way that would imitate so much of the animosity of our political culture.”
He speaks as a good shepherd, as Christ modeled for us. Even more, he cooly responds to those who accused him of weaponizing a sacrament:
“This is simply application of Church teaching. One would have to demonstrate that a person’s actions in following Church teaching is explicitly for a political purpose in order to justify the accusation of ‘weaponizing’ the Eucharist.”
Whoopi Goldberg had to inject herself into the conversation by declaiming,
“That’s not your job, Dude! That’s not up to you to make that decision. What is the point of communion? It’s for sinners. It’s the reward of saints, but the bread of sinners. How dare you!”
How dare YOU, Whoopi.
Apparently, her star turn in “Sister Act” has deluded Ms. Goldberg into believing that SHE is a proper guardian of the sacraments.
As the bard put it,
”The lady doth protest too much, methinks”
And as the theologian on the program, Jonathan Morris, points out, it IS the job of an archbishop to ensure that the sacraments aren’t abused. Not Nancy Pelosi. Not Whoopi Goldberg.
The risk of taking communion unworthily
Ultimately, Catholics are only supposed to receive communion if they are in a state of grace. The Church tells us that promoting abortion in the public square separates us from Christ. St. Paul warns us in 1 Corinthians 11:27 to never take communion unworthily:
“So then, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord.”
Abortion poisons the flock. Archbishop Cordileone wishes to protect his flock, and in the case of Nancy Pelosi, to protect her from herself.
[YOUR children can change the world! Pulse Life Advocates is developing a new video project, “How to raise pro-life children.” It can only be completed with YOUR financial support. Can you help? Donate now.]