Father Kenneth Doyle
Q. During the 1970s, at least in our part of the country, there were many priests who smoked cigarettes or cigars. Yet some of them were effective in their ministry and obviously loved God greatly. When they die, as some of them already have, can they still go to heaven? Does Jesus’ admonition, “Nothing that goes into a man can harm him, but only that which comes out of him — avarice, greed, etc.” apply here? (Bridgewater, New Jersey)
A. I’m confident that the priests of the 1970s who smoked tobacco products are probably in heaven — certainly, those of them who, as you say, “were effective in their ministry and loved God greatly.”
At that time, evidence of the long-term health hazards of smoking was only starting to be assembled. As recently as 1997, the Catechism of the Catholic Church said in No. 2290 that the virtue of temperance cautions against excess and therefore forbids “the abuse of food, alcohol, tobacco or medicine” — the clear implication being that smoking was not an intrinsic moral evil.
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Today, though, there might well be a stricter moral calculus as information grows about the risks of tobacco use. The World Health Organization says, for example, that every 6.5 seconds someone dies from tobacco-related causes.
Such scientific documentation is making inroads on the ethical judgments of the Catholic Church — as seen in a 2004 article in the scholarly Jesuit review La Civilta Cattolica which, while stopping short of branding smoking as per se sinful, declared that smokers cannot damage their health and that of others “without moral responsibility.” (Significant here is that articles in La Civilta Cattolica are prescreened for doctrinal orthodoxy by the Vatican Secretariat of State.)
As for the quote you mention from Matthew 15:11 (the New American Bible has it as, “It is not what enters one’s mouth that defiles that person; but what comes out of the mouth is what defiles one”), that passage does not exculpate smokers. Its context was a comment by Jesus on Jewish dietary laws, and it has nothing to do with ingesting products that are medically harmful.
Q. Why can’t penitents have the option of confessing their sins either face to face or in a traditional confessional? Since some find it uncomfortable to sit directly in front of the priest and be identified, why do some churches force that method? (City of origin withheld)
A. Catholic penitents do, in fact, have the right to anonymity in confession if they so desire. The Code of Canon Law says (in No. 964.2): “The conference of bishops is to establish norms regarding the confessional; it is to take care, however, that there are always confessionals with a fixed grate between the penitent and the confessor in an open place so that the faithful who wish to can use them freely.”
Many people do feel comfortable sitting in front of a priest and confessing face to face.
When I hear confessions each Saturday afternoon, probably 85 percent of penitents choose the face-to-face option, while the others kneel or sit behind an opaque screen — and the choice seems to bear no relationship to the age of the penitent. (One elderly gentleman said recently, “I prefer you to know who I am; I wouldn’t go to a doctor unless he knew my medical history.”)
Still, care must be taken to accommodate those who prefer the traditional manner of confessing; and so confessional rooms are typically constructed to allow either option, and at a penance service, when there are several individual confessors, at least one of the priests should be seated behind a screen or grate to allow for the choice of anonymity.
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It is hard to fathom how today’s Catholic Church could consider cigarette smoking as being just short of sinful. And what does “just short of sinful” mean? Is it a sin or not? Why can’t the Church speak clearly anymore? Perhaps the reason is that the Church is trying to force secular worldly issues into moral ones, and they don’t fit. The Church has no business being of this world because its mission is being of the next world. Of the heavenly realm. That is why when it tries to act worldly and conform to societal norms like political correctness, likeability, and religious compromise, just like a government would, it can’t articulate a simple clear moral message.
And as for smoking, if a person smokes because they are suicidal and have a secret wish to kill or maim themselves (a sin), they need counseling because they are not going to get their death wish, at least not anytime soon. The effects of smoking are long term, gradual, and uncertain since they vary from person to person and for many, smoking has no detrimental impact at all. And for most others the impacts are minor. Secondary smoke is even less of a health issue.
The reality is that no one in their right mind smokes to kill or main themselves or others. People smoke for pleasure, or because they are addicted and can not stop, or because they do not believe that smoking will hurt them or hurt others. So where is the sinfulness?
Also if the Church starts weighing in on the morality of cigarette smoking, wouldn’t the same thinking have to be applied to many other areas? For example over medicating on pain killers, overusing anti depressants or mood/energy boosters. What about alcoholic consumption and its long term affect on the body, or casual drug use and drug dependency? How about over eating and getting fat and developing high blood pressure and heart problems? Is the Catholic Church going to tell all of us that overeating is sinning? What does being fat have to do with getting to heaven?
Today’s Catholic Church seems to be morally disoriented and becoming more and more like a secular institution making secular decisions that affect secular quality of life issues. One has to ask was that the reason why Jesus Christ founded His Church. To make people more healthy or to get them to heaven?