Pope Francis, Urging Less Judgment, Signals Path for Divorced on Communion
The New York Times‘ Jim Yardley and Laurie Goodstein report, “In a broad proclamation on family life, Pope Francis on Friday called for the Roman Catholic Church to be more welcoming and less judgmental, and he seemingly signaled a pastoral path for divorced and remarried Catholics to receive holy communion.” The 256-page apostolic exhortation, they write, “calls for priests to welcome single parents, gay people and unmarried straight couples who are living together.” It does not open the door to same-sex marriage, but it also “offers no new rules or marching orders, and from the outset Francis makes plain that no top-down edicts are coming.”