Legal News

Conservative lawyer denied communion for supporting Obama

By Jason Siegel

Pepperdine Law School professor Douglas Kmiec was denied communion at his church, because he supported pro-choice candidate Barack Obama, National Public Radio reported. (LISTEN)

Kmiec was previously dean of The Catholic University and constitutional legal counsel in the Office of Legal Counsel when Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush were president.

According to Kmiec, a group of Catholic business people asked him to speak at the church about why he was supporting a pro-choice candidate. Before he was to speak, mass was celebrated and the priest talked about Kmiec and other supporters of pro-choice candidates as participating in a grave moral evil, according to Kmiec.

"I presented myself for communion and he shook his head...and I said, 'I think you're making a serious mistake, Father,' and he said 'I don't think I've made any mistake,' Kmiec told NPR.

Two canon lawyers told the NPR that the priest goofed.

While disagreeing with Kmiec's electoral choice of a candidate who is pro-choice, lay canon lawyer Edward Peters writes that Kmiec is owed an apology. Peters, a graduate faculty member at Sacred Heart Major Seminary, cites several canon laws to that end on his blog In Light of the Law.

Full post as published by Legal Pad | LA on June 05, 2008 (boomark / email).