Cardinal Walter Brandmüller, one of the two living cardinals to have signed the dubia addressed to Pope Francis, has spoken out against the “heresy” of supporting remarriage. In a rare and lengthy interview with Frankfurter Allgemeine, Cardinal Brandmüller, the Vatican’s former chief historian, said that the Council of Trent had proclaimed the indissolubility of marriage as a dogma. This means, the cardinal said, that entering a new union after civil divorce is a grave sin. This has consequences for the Eucharist, the cardinal said: “Whoever is aware of having committed a grave sin can only receive Communion if he has been to Confession, has confessed and has been absolved.” Some bishops have said that the remarried can receive Communion without a resolution to live “as brother and sister”. Their argument rests on a footnote in the Pope’s exhortation Amoris Laetitia. Cardinal Brandmüller said: “I am now being told that the entire moral-theological tradition of the Church can be overruled by a footnote. Here I look to the authority of the Church Fathers.” To clarify these and other confusions, five dubia, or questions – were sent to the Pope last year by Cardinals Joachim Meisner, Carlo Caffarra (both of whom died this year), Raymond Burke and Brandmüller. In the new interview, the cardinal defended their decision to publish the dubia. “People ask us, among other things: ‘Why aren’t you cardinals doing anything?’ After all, we have sworn an official oath and are the Pope’s advisers. We asked for an audience and received no answer.”