Religion & Law

Over at The Catholic Thing, Austin Ruse has a column today in which he says, in part:

A reliable source tells me that someone representing the Obama administration is about to put pressure on the papal nuncio to the United States to get Archbishop Raymond Burke to be quiet. The Obama complaint is that Archbishop Burke, who is now head of the Apostolic Signatura in Rome, has supported another bishop in his chastisement of Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius for her support of abortion.

A few days ago Archbishop Burke gave an interview to the San Diego-based organization Catholic Action for Faith and Family, during which he took the gloves off about Sebelius, who has been nominated to head the massive U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. He noted her ?public association with some of the more notorious agents of the culture of death.? This, of course, was a reference to her hosting a party for the late-term abortionist George Tiller, currently on trial in Kansas for nineteen infractions of abortion restrictions.

*          *          *

Burke closed the interview by issuing a challenge to his brother bishops, most notably Archbishop Donald Wuerl of Washington, D.C.: ?Every bishop is held to the same universal discipline which has been in force since the time of St. Paul the Apostle and is stated in canon 915 of the Code of Canon Law.? And then this: ?Whether Governor Sebelius is in the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas, or in any other diocese [italics Ruse?s], she should not present herself for Holy Communion because, after pastoral admonition, she obstinately persists in serious sin.?

*          *          *

And now there is word that someone who is well known among Republicans, and who has served in previous Republican administrations, is reaching out on behalf of the Obama administration to get the Holy See to quiet Burke, or at least to make it clear he speaks not for the Church, but only for himself.

*          *          *

By trying to stop a bishop from commenting on internal Church matters, the Obama administration wades into dangerous waters. Archbishop Burke is the head of the Apostolic Signatura, the Vatican office that is charged with interpreting the Code of Canon Law. The proper reception of Communion is proper to the Code of Canon Law, and therefore proper to any bishop, and especially to Archbishop Burke.

The pressure won't work, of course. Burke is just too smart, and tough. But Obama and his representatives are coming dangerously close to interfering in internal Church matters. More than anything else, the free exercise clause of the First Amendment to the Constitution was intended precisely to protect religious bodies from meddling by the state, even covert meddling by the White House like this. Obama and his pet Catholics should back off ? and fast.

In the comments section, Ruse tells us that the Obama's emmisary is not Prof. Kmiec.