Catholic Church Sends Warning To Politicians Who Vote Pro-Abortion, Denies New Mexico Democrat Communion

It goes without saying that if you love God our creator, you love and protect life.

This is why anyone who claims to be Catholic cannot support abortion and participate in holy communion.

The two just don’t go together like oil and vinegar!

Catholicism isn’t a buffet, and you can’t pick and choose what you want to believe in.

Finally, the Catholic Church is stepping up and sending a message to Catholic politicians who vote in favor of abortion!

In New Mexico, the Bishop of Las Cruces, Rev. Peter Baldacchino, will NOT give communion to politicians who vote pro-abortion.

Democrat Senator Joe Cervantes attends church in the Diocese of Las Cruces and received communion until recently.

Noticing this, Rev. Baldacchino reached out to Cervantes repeatedly to discuss his pro-abortion stance on Senate Bill 10.

Senate Bill 10 is anti-life and repeals the abortion ban in New Mexico, something all Catholics should be against.

Cervantes was contacted multiple times and made aware that he should not receive communion if he voted for the bill.

What happened when Cervantes showed up to mass over the weekend and tried to receive communion?

Denied!

I was denied communion last night by the Catholic bishop here in Las Cruces and based on my political office. My new parish priest has indicated he will do the same after the last was run off. Please pray for church authorities as Catholicism transitions under Pope Francis.

— Sen. Joe Cervantes (@SenJoeCervantes) July 17, 2021

After a state senator said he was denied Communion because of politics, his diocese responded: "He was contacted multiple times prior, letting him know that if he voted for Senate Bill 10 he should not present himself for communion" https://t.co/rwMl0wokwM

— Catholic News Agency (@cnalive) July 19, 2021

Voting pro-abortion starkly contradicts being pro-life.

Why is that so hard for pro-abortion politicians to understand?

Senator Cervantes, you in fact are excommunicated latae sententiae, you can’t support abortion and receive communion. The Catholic Doctrine can’t change and no one can change it. Educate your please.

— Rafael Mijangos (@RafaelMijangos) July 20, 2021

New Mexico Democrat state senator Joe Cervantes feigned surprise over being denied Holy Communion after being warned to not present himself for Communion.

Watch Church Militant Evening News 6:30 Eastern at https://t.co/z5Zv1YQFOs pic.twitter.com/RM3nGkOl1n

— Church Militant (@Church_Militant) July 20, 2021

https://twitter.com/abitterclinger/status/1417376011952427008

I fully support the Bishop of Las Cruces, Most Rev. Peter Baldacchino, who properly denied Communion to a pro-abortion Catholic. I fully support all priests who protect the Eucharist from sacrilege.

Repent, @SenJoeCervantes @SpeakerPelosi @JoeBiden before you meet your Maker. https://t.co/d32Gl5LedP

— 🇺🇸🌹Ave Maria🌹🇺🇸 (@AveMaria1776) July 20, 2021

Life Site News has more on the story:

A New Mexico bishop last weekend denied Holy Communion to a lawmaker in his diocese who helped pass a recent pro-abortion law.

“I was denied communion last night by the Catholic bishop here in Las Cruces and based on my political office,” state Sen. Joe Cervantes (D) tweeted on Saturday. “My new parish priest has indicated he will do the same after the last was run off,” Cervantes continued. 

“Please pray for church authorities as Catholicism transitions under Pope Francis,” he said.

Cervantes, a pro-abortion Democrat, earlier this year co-sponsored Senate Bill 10, which repealed an inactive state statute that restricted abortion and protected conscience rights of healthcare providers. Cervantes had voted for legislation similar to Senate Bill 10 in 2019.

“There should be no laws which outlaw the private decisions regarding pregnancy,” the senator told the Albuquerque Journal in 2020. New Mexico has some of the laxest abortion rules in the nation, allowing elective abortion through all nine months of pregnancy. 

Cervantes also backed a law this year that made New Mexico the ninth state in the U.S. to authorize doctor-assisted suicide. 

The Diocese of Las Cruces responded on Monday to Cervantes’ tweet, diocese communications director Christopher Velasquez telling Catholic News Agency that “we regret the decision of Senator Cervantes to politicize this issue.” 

Velasquez noted that the denial of Communion to Sen. Cervantes came after his local priest repeatedly attempted to contact him about his support of Senate Bill 10. 

The bishop of Las Cruces, Rev. Peter Baldacchino, “did not receive a response from the senator” either, even though Cervantes “was contacted multiple times prior, letting him know that if he voted for Senate Bill 10, he should not present himself for communion,” Velasquez said. 

Bishop Baldacchino, formerly an auxiliary bishop of Miami and a priest with the archdiocese of Newark, New Jersey, notably was the first American bishop to resume public Mass amid the COVID-19 crisis last year. 

His decision to withhold the Eucharist from Sen. Cervantes has been met with an outpouring of support from Catholics on social media. “We applaud the Bishop of @ROMDIOLC for standing up for the Truth! Pray for our bishops to be strong like Bishop Peter Baldacchino,” Catholic Connect tweeted on Monday. 

“Your bishop is doing a great job,” Twitter user Gabrielle tweeted in response to Cervantes on Saturday. “I am pleased to see a Catholic Bishop acting like a Catholic Bishop,” wrote another user. 

Last month, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) voted to begin drafting a document that could clarify whether lawmakers like Cervantes who promote abortion should be denied the Eucharist. The Vatican had tried to suppress the measure, which passed 168-55. 

Dozens of congressional Democrats have also revolted against the policy, writing in an open letter in June that “the weaponization of the Eucharist to Democratic lawmakers for their support of a woman’s safe and legal access to abortion is contradictory.”

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The Catholic Church recognizes abortion to be “gravely contrary to the moral law,” as The Catechism of the Catholic Church declares. “Formal cooperation in an abortion constitutes a grave offense. The Church attaches the canonical penalty of excommunication to this crime against human life.”

“In the case of an intrinsically unjust law, such as a law permitting abortion or euthanasia, it is therefore never licit to obey it, or to ‘take part in a propaganda campaign in favor of such a law, or vote for it,’” Pope St. John Paul II wrote in his encyclical Evangelium Vitae. 

Then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger reiterated those teachings in a doctrinal note while serving as the head of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith and stressed in a 2004 memo to U.S. bishops that politicians who vote for pro-abortion policies engage in “formal cooperation” in the “grave sin” of abortion.

Pelosi and Biden are officially on notice!

Let’s hope their Churches follow suit as soon as possible.