Today is the Feast of St. Joseph, husband of the Blessed Virgin Mary and foster father of Jesus. Gus talks about the saint’s mostly unknown life and profound legacy and then is joined by Fr. Leo Patalinghug who talks about a number of Catholic things with Gus, including homilies and the lessons he taught his students when he was a homiletics instructor. He also talks about us as Catholics having a missionary spirit and things that we can do to implement that. They wrap up their discussion talking about Saint Joseph, the saint whose feast we celebrate today, and his relationship with him.
Later, Gus is joined by Fr. Donald Haggerty, a priest at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City who is often heard on the Catholic Channel’s morning mass broadcast that airs before Seize the Day. He’s also the author of the new Ignatius Press book, “The Hour of Testing: Spiritual Depth and Insight in a Time of Ecclesial Uncertainty.” Fr. Donald explains that there are a lot of hot button issues today challenging and threatening the Church and he explores what it means to pursue holiness seriously in the 21st century. He tells us that we have to have a serious understanding that, because of our sinful humanity, Jesus will be in agony until the end of the world and that has to be central to our spiritual lives in order to have a more perfect union with him. Fr. Haggerty also shares his vocation story.
Afterwards, Gus opens up the phones to listeners. During his conversation with Fr. Haggerty, a lot of hot-button issues facing the Church like gay marriage and communion for divorced-and-civilly-remarried Catholics came up. Gus invites listeners to call in and share how important those issues are.
St. Joseph, pray for us!
Gus, on Wednesday the 19th I was on the road and caught the tail end of your show on SiriusXM. Maybe I misunderstood the part that I heard but I was under the impression that you believed divorced Catholics cannot receive communion. From what I have always been taught, divorce is not a sin. Remarrying after the divorce is a sin. Jesus said so about the remarrying part. There are some instances in which divorce seems like a no brainer such as physical abuse and or emotional abuse of a spouse. Nobody signed up for that when they got married.
If I misheard what you said, great. If not, could you please explain to me why divorced Catholics should not receive communion?
Thanks so much,
Gary Kimble
garyk9876@gmail.com