In a recent interview, Bishop Franz-Josef Bode of Osnabrück, one of three German delegates to the Synod of Bishops, has said that the debate is not just about singular questions on marriage and family, but about the fundamental decision on how to face the developments in Europe and the world. Katholisch.de reports.
Bishop Bode looks critically at the tensions between Church teaching and the lives of the faithful, a topic on which he has been criticised before, when he was understood to consider that reality as one source of revelation among others. “Of course it is a great strength that the Church so strongly defends the indissolubility of marriage,” but when that ideal no longer relates to life, the bishop explains, it is ineffective.
Not surprisingly, Bishop Bode again wonders if a second civil marriage of Catholics should always exclude them from the sacraments, while at the same time underlining the value of monogamy, fidelity and indissolubility that has been recognised since the early Church. The bishop desires a pastoral solution, inclusing long-term pastoral support of the persons concerned, but speaks out against a second marriage according to the Orthodox model. However, a blessing of a second relationship could be a future possibility.
Perhaps most noteworthy is that Bishop Bode does not favour regional differences in the sacrament of marriage, something that the German bishops have been accused of striving for. “At the heart of marriage and family, we can not deeply disagree.”
Lastly, Bishop Bode warns against considering the questions of marriage and family only from the point of view of sexual morality. Marriage is, in the first place, a community of shared responsibility, he says. On this topic, and also when it comes to extramarital and same-sex relationships, the Church must follow the example of Jesus, who always “first considered the person and then noticed him in his weakness”.
In Caelo et in Terra 