Biden and Communion: 6 Points for the US Bishops to Consider

National Catholic Register, 11 December 2020

What are the U.S. bishops to do about a Catholic in the White House who is aggressively pursuing policies contrary to the settled teaching of the Catholic Church?

Cardinal Wilton Gregory of Washington offered a welcoming smile to presumptive President-elect Joe Biden, promising dialogue on matters of mutual agreement instead of disagreement over abortion and religious liberty. In return, Biden kicked the Catholic Church in the teeth.

The nomination of Xavier Becerra, attorney general of California and a Catholic, as secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), signals that a Biden White House intends to fully turn the screws upon Catholics and other religious believers in service of a radical pro-abortion and anti-religious-liberty agenda. 

Becerra, among various outrages, went to the Supreme Court in order to force pro-life pregnancy centers to advertise abortions. He lost that time. But he will be back again, leading HHS in resuming its Obama-Biden-era litigation against the Little Sisters of the Poor.

So what are the U.S. bishops to do about a Catholic in the White House who is aggressively pursuing policies contrary to the settled teaching of the Catholic Church? In particular, should Joe Biden be refused Holy Communion?

At the conclusion of the USCCB meeting in November, Archbishop José Gomez of Los Angeles, president of the conference, announced a task force that will steer interactions with the new president.

Short-circuiting that examination, Cardinal Gregory announced that he would prefer cooperation rather than confrontation with the new president and that he would not deny Biden Holy Communion, just as he was not denied Holy Communion for the eight years he served as vice president.

The new cardinal’s approach was challenged on two fronts of late. 

It was explicitly challenged by Archbishop Charles Chaput, emeritus of Philadelphia, who hammered Cardinal Gregory’s approach in First Things as “undermining the work of the task force to deal precisely with this and related issues” and giving “scandal to the many Catholics who struggle to stay faithful to Church teaching.”

It was implicitly challenged by Biden’s nomination of Becerra: It would be hard to imagine a nominee more hostile to pro-life and religious-liberty concerns than Becerra. Biden met Cardinal Gregory’s outstretched hand with a clenched fist to the face.

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