Cardinal Wuerl, in pastoral letter, calls for reassertion of Catholic identity
May 27, 2015
Cardinal Donald Wuerl of Washington has issued a pastoral letter, dated Pentecost Sunday, on “why it is so crucial that we reassert and strengthen our Catholic identity, and that our freedom to do so be respected in society and in law.”
“When I was a young priest in the 1960s and 1970s, there was much experimentation and confusion in the Church,” he recalled. “Teachers and clergy were encouraged by some to communicate an experience of God’s love, but to do it without reference to the Creed, the sacraments, or Church tradition. It did not work very well. Catholics grew up with the impression that their heritage was little more than warm, vaguely positive feelings about God.”
“Those years of experimentation left many Catholics weak, spiritually and intellectually, and unable to withstand the tsunami of secularism that came in recent decades,” he continued. “We lost many people because we failed to teach them about right and wrong, about the common good, about the nature of the human person. This left many no longer able to admit that we are sinners who need Jesus because many no longer know what sin is. This lived experience of people not being fully or correctly presented the truth of the faith illustrates why we are called to the New Evangelization.”
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Posted by: aclune9083 -
May. 29, 2015 10:47 PM ET USA
Why then does His Eminence refuse to direct his priests to deny the Eucharist who stubbornly remain in mortal sin...such as those "Catholic" politicians like Biden and Pelosi who are all-abortion, all-contraception, all-pro-homosexual, all the time, regardless of what the Church teaches? Is he and those priests not in danger of eternal damnation through such complicity with gravely immoral sin?
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Posted by: unum -
May. 28, 2015 7:40 AM ET USA
Cardinal Wurl understands the meaning of "to teach as Jesus did" and we are richer for it. He is clearly re-evangelizing his flock.
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Posted by: skall391825 -
May. 28, 2015 1:39 AM ET USA
Does he mean Catholics living an open homosexual life style, and Catholics who refuse to stop legislating for abortion will be denied the Eucharist in D.C.? Or would that be too funamentalist?
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Posted by: filioque -
May. 28, 2015 1:12 AM ET USA
Maybe Cardinal Wuerl would like to reassert and strengthen Catholic identity by telling any Catholic but pro-abortion politicians attending Mass within the Archdiocese of Washington that they should not present themselves for Holy Communion. He should try to meet with them privately, of course, but if they persist in their manifest grave sin of supporting abortion, then they must not be admitted to Communion (Canon 915).
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Posted by: Randal Mandock -
May. 27, 2015 9:40 AM ET USA
In the mid-1990s I found a priest who offered Mass according to the rubrics of the GIRM and mostly in accord with the conciliar and post conciliar documents of Vatican II. I joined his parish and met with him frequently. Steeped in canon law and Church history, he told me that 50 years of turmoil typically follow every ecumenical council. Here we stand 50 years after Vatican II, and finally Cardinal Wuerl and other shining lights are acknowledging the true reasons for the current malaise.
