Gerry Byrne, a Catholic, is the Liberal MP for Humber-St. Barbe-Baie Verte riding in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador. According to the Campaign Life Coalition candidate evaluations for the 2006 Federal Election, Byrne’s voting record indicates he is pro-abortion, voting also in favour of cloning and embryo experimentation (ESCR). On Sunday past, July 15, 2007, according to a highly reliable eye witness, Archbishop Brendan O’Brien of the diocese of St. John’s, NL, served the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ to Gerry Byrne at the Basilica of St. John the Baptist in St. John’s NL.
Read more at Vote Life, Canada!
When Bishops do this, they send the message that being against the rights of unborn children is not a serious moral impediment. Now it could be that the Archbishop didn't recognize the MP. It could be that the MP confessed in private.
But that's no excuse. The Archbishop should be on top of his stuff.
It makes me mad when bishops give so little regard to enforcing orthodoxy-- and this isn't some minor point of doctrine. It's not the pope hasn't preached about it.
But many Catholics don't understand that orthodoxy is not optional. And the reason they don't get this is that the bishops and all the clergy either don't believe it or don't preach it.
If bishops want the faithful to understand, accept and practice the faith, their actions must back it up. If they keep acting like it's just a trifle, that's how Catholics will treat it.
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