Courtney McGrailGermany's Catholic bishops have published a report detailing their views on marriage and family; it suggests most bishops now believe sacraments should be available to divorced and remarried Catholics who do not have an annulment. "This document contains reflections only and has no juridical power," said Matthias Kopp, spokesman for the Bonn-based bishops' conference. He said the German bishops' conference hopes "to offer its own theological contribution in this area.
While we can give no information about any follow-up, the majority of bishops agreed with the timing of its publication." The bishops published ‘Theologically Responsible and Pastorally Appropriate Ways for Accompanying the Divorced and Remarried’ on the bishops' conference website late last month. The spokesman said the bishops had decided to delay issuing the report, prepared for the October 5-19 extraordinary Synod of Bishops on the family, until the end of 2014. He said the bishops now would concentrate on preparing a formal submission to the worldwide synod assembly in October.
In a statement on the bishops' website, Cardinal Reinhard Marx, conference president, said the report had been approved by a "large majority" of German Church leaders.
He added that the search for pastoral approaches to the divorced and remarried was "one of urgent challenges facing the Catholic Church in its evangelisation worldwide. Civil divorce and remarriage often cause people to distance themselves from the church, or widen the distance they already felt before divorce," Cardinal Marx said.
"It is not uncommon for this evolution to lead to the abandonment of the Christian faith, and this is why the German bishops' conference wants to step up its pastoral outreach."
