Saint Maria Bertilla Boscardin

October 20th, 2015

Reverend Fathers of the Catholic Church,

first of all, I offer you my daughterly and deferential respects.

I address, with my heart in my hands, all of you, and in particular those of you who believe it is right to allow divorced and remarried people to access the Holy Eucharistic Table.

I reveal to you, dear fathers, that I have been praying and meditating for a while, in my littleness, on such matter. But, in all honesty, as much as I applied myself, I have not found any valid reason that can convince me that such "opening" is possible, without betraying, with this, the perennial Doctrine of the Church and - before this and even more so - the Holy Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ.

He, the Incarnate Word and Divine Teacher, teaches us:

Mark 10, 11-12

¹¹ He answered, “Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her. ¹² And if she divorces her husband and marries another man, she commits adultery.”

This, dear fathers, as you well know, is God's Word and, as such, there is no human - nor ecclesiastical - power that can modify it; that is: that can modify it without the disappearance of the true apostolic and catholic Faith.

Among other things, as a christian, I am sorry and disappointed when I realize that some of you, reverend fathers, in this Synod, rather than teaching virtue - the virtue of the Sacrament of Matrimony - and making it shine, prefer to strive, thorugh various attempts of improbable acrobatics between Doctrine and pastoral, to see how to endorse and justify vice.

When I hear that some of you have made themselves, in a strong and decisive way, paladins of this "innovation", according to which it would be good to allow divorced and remarried people to access the Holy Eucharistic Communion, I pray in a special way for your souls, dear Pastors, because I am horrified by thinking about the disastrous consequences - compared to which a natural disaster would be a small thing: because, in such a case, it would be a huge spiritual tragedy - that this "opening" would provoke, with a snowball effect.

In fact, if people who live in a state of adultery (objectively, a serious, obvious sin) can legitimately approach the Divine Banquet, the consequences are that:

- first of all, you will be personally responsible for the unworthy reception of the consacrated Host by these unrepentant sinners; who, when at the present time approach the holy altar to receive the Body of Christ, do so because of their personal decision; but certainly without the explicit and official approval expressed by the Church of Jesus Christ.

The Church, His mystical Bride and His body, has already expressed several times, with great clarity and precision, Christ's thought regarding this issue, both with reference to the Letter of St. Paul the Apostle to Corynthians:

1 Corinthians 11, 23-29

²³ For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you: The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, ²⁴ and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, “This is my body, which is for you; do this in remembrance of me.” ²⁵ In the same way, after supper he took the cup, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood; do this, whenever you drink it, in remembrance of me.” ²⁶ For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.

²⁷ So then, whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord. ²⁸ Everyone ought to examine themselves before they eat of the bread and drink from the cup. ²⁹ For those who eat and drink without discerning the body of Christ eat and drink judgment on themselves.

and through the holy and illuminated teaching by Saint John Paul II (Ecclesia de Eucharistia, Chapter 4, 36-37) and by the Holy Father Benedict XVI (Sacramentum caritatis, Eucharist and indissolubility of matrimony, 29).

So the most serious and devastating consequence would be the many eucharistic sacrileges that would unavoidable multiply. Combined to the fact that you, dear fathers, who have been called and elected by God Himself, to aid Him in the holy ministry of souls' salvation, would sadly end up counter-ministering, that is (it is sad to say so) for the eternal damnation of the souls who were entrusted to you.

Could it ever be possible, I asked myself, that the Roman Catholic Apostolic Church can give the Holy Eucharist - the supreme Pearl that It received as a gift by its Spouse and Lord Jesus Christ, in the Last Supper, to unworthy people? No, I responded, this is not possible; and should such a concession be made, even only with the excuse of "pastoral exceptions", then the people allowing this will have been "men of the Church" who have apostatized the true Faith, and not "the Catholic Church". Because, should the Lord Jesus' Word - so clear, so transparent - be disattended and eluded, we would be witnessing the disastrous creation of another reality, that could not - without the shadow of a doubt - be and be called the Catholic Church.

- Should remarried, divorced people be allowed by you to approach the Body and Blood of Christ in Sacrament while remaining identical - and that is, in a state and life condition that objectively contrast God's Law and contraddict the loving union between Christ and the Church, that is signified and realized in the Eucharist (Sacramentum caritatis, 29) - the consequence is that not only them, but every other unrepentant sinner will be able to claim the same "right". But, by allowing this, the catholic doctrine regarding sanctifying Grace, which is the main and unavoidable prerequisite for a worthy reception of the Holy Eucharistic Communion, would be implicitely demolished.

- Moreover, also the Sacrament of Confession or Repentance would no longer need to exist, since we would be, in fact, living no longer in a catholic but protestant concept of Mercy. A faulty, diabolic "mercy", that will only bring about a fake peace of conscience - that reaches everyone without the necessity for the sinner to freely accept God's Forgiveness: according to this preposterous thesis, God forgives you always and anyway, without the need for you to repent from your sins and mean to change your life. An absolution without conversion.

- Another consequence of this deceptive pietism will unavoidably be that the undissolvability of the Marriage Sacrament will become ridiculous: a principle only on paper, but in reality, in common practice, quietly eluded; because, it is known, these days there is an abyss between Doctrine and the way many people live, so "the solution", according to certain pastors, is to throw smoke in people's eyes, and to continue to state with words that the Doctrine is not being changed, but it is only a pastoral adjustment, considering the fast evolutions (involutions, I say, towards the highest spiritual and moral degradation, in clear opposition to the project of true love designed by God the Creator, who through His Son Jesus Christ, dead and resurrected for all, calls us to participate in Divine Life) of costumes and the very concept of family.

The consequence is that, by allowing remarried divorced people to receive the Holy Eucharist, a significant opening will be granted to the recognition (and blessing?) of any type of union, since, as a clergy recently stated: "Any love comes from God". I ask: "Even homosexual love, Eminence? Even pedophilia? Even beastliness?". Or yet, I heard phrsases such as: "Every remarried divorced person should be free to follow his/her conscience and to decide on his/her own whether or not it is legitimate to receive the Holy Communion".

When I read such statements, my first inclination is to ask myself: "Is this a joke?", because I seriously ask myself wheither it is possible, at the end of a Synod about family (all the more, divided into two parts), to end up with such absurd statements. In fact, if everything, in christian moral and ethics, were attributed to the mere personal conscience, considered as an absolute parameter for distinguishing between good and evil, then, excuse me, reverend fathers: why even have this synodal assembly to begin with? And even more: what is the purpose of the Church itself, hierarchical and charismatic, with the authoritative teaching of Magisterium?

We have received, as a gift, an immense and mostly precious heritage: the apostolic Faith in the Lord Jesus; the Dogms; the authentic Magisterium. Let us not throw all of this away for an accomodating compromise with world's fashions, and not even for the fake belief that, by lowering the level of moral and spiritual requirements set by the Gospel, the churches will be full of people once again. What a big deception this is, venerable fathers!

Dear fathers,

I have written to you with parrhesia, moved uniquely by my love for Christ and His Church.

I beg you to fully realize the serious responsibility that, as pastors, you have above all towards the Pastor and supreme Custodian of our souls, the Man God Jesus Christ.

He, who has appointed you as Bishops of His Catholic Church, is asking you to feed the sheep of His beloved flock with breads of Truth and the pure milk of true Love who, for us believers, is only Christ.

My wish is that we can be, united by Holy Spirit, pastors and flock, still and even more light and salt in this troubled time.

Let us certainly welcome with true compassion - in the forms and ways that the authentic spirit of christian charity suggests us - many brothers and sisters who suffer in different ways; but let us not forget to keep our glance fixed on God and especially on the Lord Jesus who is truly present in the Holy Sacrament.

He - who is the Way - will show us the path to true Life. Sursum corda!

Sabrina Luraschi Corbetta