Rainbow Sash: Eucharist is about Christ, not protest

By Michelle Martin
Staff writer

As Cardinal George took increasing public criticism for his directive to deny the Eucharist to protesters wearing rainbow sashes on Pentecost Sunday, he—as well as gay activists—pointed out that the problem wasn’t that the protesters were identifying themselves as homosexual, it was that they were using the Eucharist for a political statement.

“When you come with a statement about yourself, that’s not the way to receive it,” said Cardinal George in an interview on the “Catholic Community of Faith” radio show May 28. “Eucharist is not a place to deform the meaning of our beliefs. Our most profound act of worship is receiving Holy Communion. We can talk this through in other places, but not make the Eucharist a statement—except that this is the Body of Christ and we receive it on his terms.”

The issue first arose in 2000, when a local chapter of the Rainbow Sash Movement was denied communion at Holy Name Cathedral. Members of the movement say they wear the sashes to bring visibility to gays and lesbians within the church, and the organization’s mission statement says that it is “publicly calling the Catholic Church to conversion of heart around issues of human sexuality.”

The organization had notified the cardinal before Pentecost (May 30) that they intended to approach the altar for Communion while wearing their sashes. Cardinal George, who was returning from his ad limina visit to the Vatican, sent a directive to priests in the archdiocese to deny them the Eucharist.

The letter said his decision was based on a national policy of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. However, bishops in some parts of the country did allow Rainbow Sash members to receive the Eucharist. (Cardinal George addresses the subject as part of his regular column. See Page 3.)

As The Catholic New World went to press, Catholic News Service reported that a spokesman for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said that body did not have a specific policy regarding Rainbow Sash.

Susan Gibbs, Washington archdiocesan communications director, said the decision to deny Rainbow Sash protestors Eucharist originally came during a Mass in 2000 at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception concelebrated by the country’s bishops. It was made by then-Cardinal James Hickey of Washington, and in subsequent years repeated by Cardinal McCarrick.

Cardinal George acknowledged the conference had not voted on such a policy, but said that since it had been implemented for a USCCB Mass, it could be understood as having national implications.

Joe Murray, founder of the Chicago Rainbow Sash Movement, did not return calls from The Catholic New World, but he had told media that it hurt to be turned away from the altar with a blessing, instead of receiving Communion.

“It was painful to be turned away,” Murray reportedly said. “We are good enough to be blessed, but we are not good enough to get the Holy Eucharist. …This is about personal prejudice by Cardinal George. I will pray for the cardinal.”

But Gene Janowski, a former member of the movement, disagreed with Murray’s assertion. Janowski wore a rainbow sash at Pentecost in 2000 and was denied Communion, but later participated in an hour-long meeting with the cardinal following that Mass. The following year, Janowski said, the cardinal gave him and other members of the movement Communion while they wore their sashes.

“We told him that our main objective was just to be visible, and that we do accept the teaching magisterium of the church,” Janowski said.

Janowski said he left the movement to start a gay and lesbian outreach at his parish, St. Benedict (Irving Park).

Gay activist Rick Garcia, political director for Equality Illinois, said he is no fan of Cardinal George when it comes to the way he relates to the gay community, especially the cardinal’s opposition to a antidiscrimination bill that specifically would have included homosexuals.

But Garcia, a well-known homosexual activist, said he receives Communion nearly every day, and has never been turned away. Hundreds of gay and lesbian Catholics gather for Mass every Sunday evening at Our Lady of Mount Carmel Church on the North Side every week with no fuss, he said, and gay Catholics receive the Eucharist at parishes all over the archdiocese.

He said he doesn’t think the activists or the church handled the situation well.

“When I turned on my TV and saw them being turned away, I was just horrified,” said Garcia. “It broke my heart. The Rainbow Sash Movement baited the cardinal, and the cardinal took the bait. It continues the perception that he’s anti-gay, and it continues to hurt the Catholic mothers out there who now think my gay son or my lesbian daughter can’t receive Communion. … If you have a problem with the cardinal, take it to the chancery, not to the altar.”