President Joe Biden dismissed concerns a group of U.S. Catholic bishops would succeed in blocking him and other pro-abortion rights officials from receiving Holy Communion.
“That’s a private matter, and I don’t think that’s going to happen,” he told reporters Friday at the White House.
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The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops voted 168-55, with six abstentions, on Friday to draft “a formal statement on the meaning of the Eucharist in the life of the Church” in a way that could deny Biden, the country’s second Catholic president, from receiving the bread and wine sacrament. The move, discouraged by the Vatican, could also affect House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
The organization’s Committee on Doctrine has been tasked with working on the document, which could include guidance on politicians who support abortion rights, as local bishops currently exercise their own discretion.
“This is a Catholic president that’s doing the most aggressive thing we’ve ever seen in terms of this attack on life when it’s most innocent,” Archbishop Joseph Naumann of Kansas City said during Friday’s 3½-hour meeting.
Other bishops echoed the Vatican by voicing concerns the effort could exacerbate divisions in the church as people start returning to in-person services as the coronavirus pandemic wanes.
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The statement will likely be presented in November.
