Vatican clarifies Church rules on divorce and Communion
Amid rising expectations in the media that the Catholic church might make it easier for divorced and remarried members to receive Communion, the Vatican's highest doctrinal official reaffirmed church teaching barring such persons from the sacrament without an annulment of their first sacramental marriage.
But Archbishop Gerhard Muller, prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, acknowledged that many Catholics' first marriages might be invalid and eligible for annulment if spouses had been influenced by prevailing contemporary conceptions of marriage as a temporary arrangement.
The archbishop's words appeared Tuesday in a 4,600-word article published in the Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano.
For more information see: www.news.va/en/news/archbishop-muller-care-of-remarried-divorcees-must