The Roman Catholic archbishop for northeast Kansas said today that Gov. Kathleen Sebelius should refrain from taking Communion until she publicly repudiates her support for abortion rights. Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann, of the Archdiocese of Kansas City in Kansas, also criticized her recent veto of a bill imposing new restrictions on abortion providers. He called upon the governor, who is Catholic, to take the “necessary steps for amendment of her life.”
Naumann said he wrote to Sebelius in August, asking her to refrain from Communion, but learned recently that she had participated in the sacrament. He said it prompted him to write her again, asking her to respect his request and “not require from me any additional pastoral actions.”
“The spiritually lethal message, communicated by our governor, as well as many other high-profile Catholics in public life, has been in effect: ‘The church’s teaching on abortion is optional!’” Naumann wrote in a column published today in The Leaven, the archdiocese’s newspaper.
The issue of Catholic politicians taking Communion arose again recently because of Pope Benedict XVI’s recent visit to the United States. In New York, Cardinal Edward Egan said former mayor and presidential candidate Rudy Guiliani had broken “an understanding” by accepting Communion at a papal Mass.
Naumann wrote: “I hope that my request of the governor, not to present herself for Holy Communion, will provoke her to reconsider the serious spiritual and moral consequences of her past and present actions.”
Sebelius spokeswoman Nicole Corcoran said the governor hasn’t seen the archbishop’s column but, “Receiving Communion has not been a problem in the past for her.”
Sebelius has been a strong and consistent supporter of abortion rights throughout her political career, starting as a Kansas House member in 1987-94. In 2002, when she ran for her first term as governor, she sought to reassure anti-abortion voters by promising not to seek major changes in Kansas’ laws on abortion.
But she also has repeatedly vetoed legislation sought by anti-abortion groups and supported by the state’s Catholic leaders.
This year’s measure was partly a response to allegations that Dr. George Tiller has performed illegal late-term abortions at his Wichita clinic. Tiller, among the few U.S. physicians who perform such procedures, has said he follows state law.
Sebelius objected most strongly to provisions allowing a patient’s spouse or family members to go to court if they believed a doctor had performed or was about to perform an illegal late-term abortion. The patient herself also could sue, but so could a local prosecutor.
She argued that the bill would encourage litigation, jeopardize patients’ privacy and allow lawsuits to block a woman’s abortion “even where it may be necessary to save her life.”
Also under the measure, doctors using ultrasound or monitoring fetal heartbeats would have to make information from those sources available to a patient at least 30 minutes before an abortion. They would have to tell their patients whether their fetuses are viable and, if not, why.
The governor rejected the bill last month, and legislators failed to override her action. Naumann wrote that Sebelius’ action showed a lack of respect for legislators and Kansans who are embarrassed that their state “has become infamous for being the late-term abortion center for the Midwest.”
“Since becoming archbishop, I have met with Governor Sebelius several times over many months to discuss with her the grave spiritual and moral consequences of her public actions by which she has cooperated in the procurement of abortions performed in Kansas,” Naumann wrote.
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