There are two types of excommunication in the Roman Catholic church: automatic and imposed. When a member commits a flagrant violation of canon law—like a person refusing to play Bingo or drink alcohol, say, or beating up the pope—he’s subject to automatic excommunication, also known as latae sententiae.
Imposed excommunication, or ferendae sententiae, occurs when the offense is less clear-cut, such as Nancy Pelosi’s corybantic support for all things abortion.
San Francisco Archbishop Salvatore Cordileone announced Friday that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is barred from receiving Holy Communion due to her pro-abortion stance -- marking an escalation in a decades-long tension between the Roman Catholic Church and liberal Democratic politicians on abortion.
Cordileone accused Pelosi of failing to “understand the grave evil she is perpetrating, the scandal she is causing, and the danger to her own soul she is risking”. He said he would need to stop her from receiving communion until she “publicly repudiates her support for abortion”.
Cordileone wrote to the California Democrat, informing her that she should not present herself for Holy Communion at Mass, and that priests will not distribute communion to her if she does present herself.
"A Catholic legislator who supports procured abortion, after knowing the teaching of the Church, commits a manifestly grave sin which is a cause of most serious scandal to others. Therefore, universal Church law provides that such persons ‘are not to be admitted to Holy Communion,'" he says in the letter.
"Direct abortion, that is to say, abortion willed either as an end or a means, is gravely contrary to the moral law," it says, before calling abortion and infanticide "abominable crimes."
The letter also declares that "Formal cooperation in an abortion constitutes a grave offense. The Church attaches the canonical penalty of excommunication to this crime against human life."
Observations
No evidence if the equally abortion-loving Joe Biden will receive the same treatment. It seems that these decisions are left up to the Archdiocese that presides over the area where the offender lives.
It remains to be seen if the Vatican will intercede on Pelosi’s behalf, with the current pope favoring leftism/communism over doctrinal orthodoxy.
It also remains to be seen if abortion-friendly Adventists will demonstrate increased compassion for Mrs. Pelosi. More likely they will say leftism is good because it’s not conservative, and conservatism is the worst thing ever—according to their misapplied prophecy (Dreadventism). Oddly, they rarely, if ever, demonstrate compassion for helpless unborn children.
Stay tuned.
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“Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying, Execute true judgment, and shew mercy and compassion every man to his brother: And oppress not the widow, nor the fatherless, the stranger, nor the poor; and let none of you imagine evil against his brother in your heart” ~ Zechariah 7:9