Concubinage
and Holy Communion

In the Light of the Law

A Roman Catholic Lawyers View on Current Event

January 04, 2011

We have posted this article for one reason and one reason
alone to demonstrate that for centuries Christian concubinage \ adultery [Where
either the husband or wife has previously married and then unrighteously
departed or divorced their partner or where both the husband and wife were both
previously married and then unrighteously departed or divorced their partners] –
that any joining of these in  false marriage,  or  common law
marriage is
sinful, corrupt and an affront against God the Father and Jesus Christ.

We have written a number of articles
exhaustively going through the words and commandments of Jesus Christ and the
Apostles; and yet we strongly sense and feel the
hardened hearts and stiff necks of those believers who openly embrace such who
do so,  and those openly and
brazenly walk in such contradiction of sin and iniquity.  These have deluded
themselves into believing that can still be right before the Lord at their own time
and say so, remaining as heirs unto salvation.

Therefore understand that if unrighteous and unholy Roman
Catholics and their priests and bishops can recognize and discern the direness
of such sin from New Testament Scripture, at the smallest dabbling in
concubinage or adultery; how much more do you suppose that God will hold accountable
those that willfully continue in
such sin, corruption?

Andrew Cuomo, governor of New York, and Sandra
Lee, a television celebrity, live in what is known technically as public concubinage. The fact
that both Cuomo and Lee are [Unrighteously] divorced
[Based upon the words and commandments
of Jesus Christ and the Apostles] renders the concubinage adulterous on both sides as well.

Under Decretal law, [Catholic Canon Law] concubinage [Concubinage
is
the state of a woman in an ongoing, usually sexual and matrimonially-oriented
relationship with a man who cannot be married to her] among [Christian] laity this was a crime that, if
not foresworn after three warnings, [As
written in the New Testament] could result in the excommunication of the offender(s). Taunton,
The Law of the Church
(1906) at 226. Under Pio-Benedictine law, lay
concubinage was a crime
that, upon conviction, could result in “exclusion from ecclesiastical
acts”, something less than interdict (itself one step shy of
excommunication). 1917 CIC 2357 § 2. Finally,
under the Johanno-Pauline Code, concubinage among lay
persons is not criminalized, though it can have some effects under marriage law which are not relevant to this case. 1983
CIC 1093.

But, notwithstanding the steady canonical
“decriminalization” of concubinage (basically for the same
kinds of reasons that led to adultery
being decriminalized in
most states), the lifestyle adopted by Cuomo and Lee continues to have—or
should have—serious consequences under Canon 915 for the reception of
holy Communion.

Cuomo, on the grounds of his public concubinage alone (and setting aside
complications arising from his strong support for legalized abortion, etc.),
should not approach Communion per Canon 916; if he
does approach, he should be refused the sacrament per Canon 915. Cuomo should
still attend Mass, of course (c. 1247), and within
one year of his last Confession he should duly receive that sacrament again (c. 989), but he
should not be taking Communion while he lives in public concubinage. And if Lee is Catholic,
the exact same analysis would apply to her.

It is Albany Bp. Howard Hubbard’s responsibility to see to it that the
common discipline of the Church is promoted and that all ecclesiastical laws
are observed, exercising particular vigilance against abuse of the sacraments
and the worship of God. 1983
CIC 392. Unfortunately, Hubbard’s
rah-rah inaugurational homily before Cuomo and Lee, in which, without
admonition for their objectively and publicly sinful status, the prelate seemed
to have anointed the pair as his kind of evangelizers in government, and his
complicity in the
administration of Communion to Cuomo, amounts, in my opinion, to another dereliction of pastoral duty.
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