The local bishop should make the call on intercommunion, Pope Francis said Thursday after last month's move by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith rejecting a draft proposal from the German bishops seeking to allow for non-Catholics to receive communion, Crux noted.
During an in-flight press conference to Rome on Thursday, Francis said he supported the Vatican’s Cardinal-elect Luis Ladaria in calling for the German proposal to be rethought.
Citing the Code of Cannon Law, he said that it was not up to local bishops' conferences to decide under what conditions communion be administered to non-Catholics, but rather a decision best made by local bishops.
Earlier this year, the German proposal was approved by about three-quarters of the bishops, however Francis pointed out that the Code of Cannon Law says the bishop of the particular church "is responsible for this… it’s in his hands."
Francis said that the Germans attempted to use their Episcopal conference to establish guidelines which the code did not foresee.
"It foresees the bishop of the diocese, but not the conference, because a thing approved by an Episcopal conference immediately becomes universal," he continued, according to The Catholic News Agency.
"The particular Church, the Code permits it, the local Church [Episcopal conference] cannot because it would be universal," he said.
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