Kudos to Crux for publishing an excellent interview with the African theologian Fr Paulinus Odozor, who was born in Nigeria and teaches at Notre Dame. I have always enjoyed Fr Odozor’s works, and his latest remarks, on Communion for the divorced and remarried, touch on some crucial issues for the whole Church.
Fr Odozor says straightforwardly, when asked whether remarried Catholics can receive Communion (without endeavouring to live in complete continence): “We settled that long ago. They can’t.” He adds that “Everyone’s OK with it,” including the divorced and remarried themselves: “If you go to the ordinary parishes in most of Africa, you will find that people who are in the situation you’re talking about would not present themselves for Communion because they already accept that these are the rules. It’s not an issue.”
