African press review 9 September 2015

The papal letter on Christian divorce and remarriage lifts hearts in Africa. Meanwhile, Kenya's Anglican Church launches a massive crackdown against gay priests.

We begin in South Africa and theMail and Guardian’s warm embrace of Pope Francis’ quiet campaign to bring disenfranchised Christians back to the Catholic Church.
The paper welcomes the Vatican’s decision Tuesday to make it easier for Catholics who wish to remarry to have their second marriages recognised by the church.

It’s a turning point in a long-running debate within the church about how it ought to approach changes in the structure of the modern family, including marriage and divorce.

Under the new Church rules, Catholics who receive a civil divorce are not excommunicated, and the church recognises that the divorce procedure is necessary to settle civil matters, including custody of children.

But divorced Catholics are not allowed to remarry until their earlier marriage has been nullified. If a Catholic has remarried civilly but not had their earlier marriage annulled, they are not allowed to receive communion.

The man charged with overseeing the changes, Monsignor Pio Vito Pinto, reportedly told a press conference that a panel of Vatican-appointed canon lawyers had spent a year studying ways of alleviating the suffering of poor people whose marriages were broken while, at the same time, ensuring that the church maintained its position that marriage is a lifelong and sacred commitment.

The papal letter on annulments comes a week after Francis the pope announced that all priests would be allowed to offer forgiveness to contrite women who have had abortions as part of the church’s jubilee year of mercy, which begins in December.

According to Mail and Guardian, under normal circumstances, forgiveness for abortion, which is considered a grave sin and punishable by automatic excommunication, can only be offered by priests given the power to do so by a bishop. Mail and Guardian says the reform is only the third revision of the process in the church’s 2,000-year history; the previous ones date back to 1741 and 1908.

Nigeria’s Punch newspaper also welcomes the new marriage annulment procedures in the Catholic Church. The paper says the process has long been criticised by many Catholics as too cumbersome, complicated and expensive.

According to Punch, such cases had required two separate judgments from a diocesan tribunal. Now, the process, overseen by local bishops will require only one judgment.

Moreover, the new rules require that the hearing process be held within 30 days of application, eliminating a longer waiting period. Francis is also instructing Catholic bishops to be more welcoming to divorced or separated Catholics “who have abandoned the church.”

And in Kenya, Daily Nation takes up a crisis in the Anglican Church following revelations by a top bishop that five of his priests had been suspended for involvement in homosexuality.

Bishop Joseph Kagunda of the Mount Kenya West diocese told the newspaper that the five suspects who are married and with children engaged in the acts without their wives’ knowledge.

The paper reports that another priest accused of enticing four young men into homosexuality was sacked by the church last Sunday. Bishop Kagunda urged members of his congregation with gay impulses to leave, stating that he was not going to bow to pressure from Western countries to preach and accept what does not please God.