A Thought about the Synod

A couple of years back, when all the world was exercised about gays marching in New York's St Patrick Day Parade (which now seems like such a quaint time), Anthony Esolen had this to say.
http://www.crisismagazine.com/2014/serpents-gone

At the time it came out, I found much wisdom in the piece.

In the parade are liars, cheats, gossips, Sabbath-breakers, and people who drink too much. In the parade are adulterers, a thief or two, a pleasant civic-minded taker of bribes, a man who beats his wife, and a wife who beats her husband. In the parade are people hooked on porn, and at least one woman who has produced some of it herself. In the parade are parents who have hurt their children and children who have hurt their parents. In the parade are fornicators, and some who have snuffed in the womb the natural result of their fornication. In the parade is a doctor who let an elderly patient die of an overdose of morphine because her relatives wanted it. In the parade are the angry, the false-hearted, the covetous, the slothful, the vain, the blasphemous, the licentious, the ambitious, the perverse, the cruel, the petty, the lukewarm, and the obscene.

Dr Esolen's point is that in any group of people, there will be sinners o'plenty.  This is perfectly illustrated in a subsequent paragraph.

In the town next to mine when I was a boy, the Italian immigrants had brought over from Gubbio a great festive parade, the Race of the Saints. Three teams of men, carrying seven-hundred-pound statues of Saint George, Saint Anthony, and Saint Ubaldo, Gubbio’s patron, would race up and down the hilly streets, to the cheers of most of their four thousand townsmen. Sin was carrying sanctity; sinners bent their backs and strained their legs to give honor to the saints. 

That is why we have a parade. We who are not always honorable show our appreciation for honor. We who are not always holy show our reverence for holiness. We who are small pay our respects to what is great. We who have received great benefits show some modest gratitude for those who have conferred them upon us.

So we're all sinners. What could go wrong?

Now let us suppose that the Royal Order of Wife-Beaters wants to add their float to the parade, with a jaunty young lady bending over to invite the man with the big paddle. Let us suppose that the Fornicators for Freedom want to march, dancing to “Paradise by the Dashboard Lights.” Let us suppose that a group calling itself Porn Again Christians wants to strut, with bikini underwear and thongs. Let us suppose that the Rumor Rustlers want to march, advertising their raison d’etre, to ferret out other people’s ugly secrets and to spread them abroad in gleeful caricatures.

Now suppose that the parade were ostensibly held to celebrate the feast day of a saint, and that a leader of the saint’s faith were to occupy the seat of honor. That would not be a case of sin carrying sanctity. It would be a case of sin marching right over the backside and the head of sanctity. Saint Patrick, according to legend, cast all the serpents out of Ireland. The new Patrick is more “inclusive.” He welcomes the serpents back in.

I've been thinking about this in terms of the recent synod.  What I'm about to say may be unpopular, but it's surely true.  Those who are divorced and remarried can, in large part, already receive Communion.  They can either just go up the aisle and deal with the looks and occasional comments, or they can change parishes.  In a large urban or suburban setting, it's possible that the great majority of people in Mass don't even know who they are or if they are married, dating, cohabiting or what.  If so they might be able to fix that by going to different mass than the one their acquaintances do.  Only people in small rural settings -- with maybe 200 parishioners and no other parish within twenty miles would everyone know their business and there's no option for another parish.

Surely the scenario I'm lining out is happening today.  It's like Dr Esolen's parade of sinners.  It's not right, and it's dangerous for the souls of the "remarried" couple that does it, but it's typical of humanity.  And it in no way impacts the teachings of the Church.  That a Church doctrine would be ignored is about as surprising as morning following night.

In the synod, however, what was being proposed is the accommodation of sin.  Now not only the couple is in jeopardy, but presumably the entire Church.  If divorce and remarriage is sinful ("remarriage" meaning marriage without annulment), then if the Church endorses it in any way, it's complicit in the sin.  In the case of the large urban or suburban parish I mentioned, the impact is, again, minimal.  Most people are unaware of the couple situation anyway. In the case of the small rural parish, the impact is more dramatic, but those are small numbers as well.  So we're not talking about widespread scandal.  But it's qualitatively different.

I'm not in favor of a remarried couple running off to another parish where no one knows them and taking part in the sacraments.  I want all people to go to heaven, and if Our Lord said that something is a sin, I'd prefer all people avoid it.  However, I can't deny that it happens, and in a way I'm OK with it.  Their sin is, after all, their sin.  As long as the Church isn't endorsing or publicly tolerating it, I can sit next to the couple in Mass and offer the sign of peace in blissful ignorance.  By the same token, I don't know if the person sitting next to me in Mass is a thief, a lier, a bigot or a scoundrel.  I know he's a sinner, but I don't know what kind of sinner.  Some day, God will work on them to the point that they will make things right.  Hopefully.

But if the Church finds an accommodation -- something that makes their sinful state not sinful -- then it does affect me.  The Church is saying that a vow I took on my wedding day doesn't apply sometimes. Suddenly there's a category of sin that the Church publicly acknowledges as sad but inevitable.  Now there's a third category of sin: Venial, Mortal and Acceptable.

That would destroy any legitimacy the Church has left to talk about sin and redemption.