The bishop who prohibited no vax priests from giving communion: “Targeted by bad messages”

The bishop of Teano Calvi who with an ad hoc pastoral disposition prohibited unvaccinated priests and deacons from distributing communion in church today was targeted by no vax. “I was bombarded with bad messages”, reports Msgr. Giacomo Cirulli, bishop of Teano-Calvi, and also a doctor. And it is above all as a doctor that Cirulli has decided to take this important step at a time when infections are increasing. “Yet here – he observes – it is an ideological question on the part of the no vax. The point is that the only way out of the pandemic is the vaccine, but in Italy this means taking on attacks and malice of all kinds. And today I was haunted by bad messages from no vaxes. I’ve also received messages of thanks, to be honest “but it is obvious that gratuitous nastiness hurts and is difficult to accept in a pandemic context. Bishop Cirulli lived the pain of Covid on his skin: “I was dying in November 2020 when there were no vaccines. I did not forbid distributing the Eucharist, but the fact is that the priests who they are not vaccinated they cannot distribute communion: to preserve themselves but also others “. Are there many no vax priests in your diocese? “There are not many but no one declares it openly. However, it is a matter of clarifying and that is what I did for my two dioceses of Teano and Calvi. The faithful understood that it was a decision of common sense. But the no vax know just making ideology, they deny the pandemic, they deny everything. This is the problem “. Hence his appeal: “Let them use their brains. Science, as long as it respects its limits, the Church and God respect it”. Monsignor Cirulli thinks about the rules that the Church has put in place since May 2020 to stem the risk of contagion and does not see the risk of returning to streaming masses: “I don’t see any risks thanks to vaccination”. As a doctor, would you introduce the obligation to vaccinate? The bishop smiles and observes: “We must find a way so that personal freedom does not affect the freedom of all the others. Then, of course, on the part of those who govern us, we need the utmost clarity”. Speaking to the Diplomatic Corps today, the Pope asked that the population be vaccinated as much as possible. Almost a declaration of vaccination obligation? “The Pontiff uses that prudence which is not lack of clarity. And as a bishop and as a doctor I fully agree with it. Then, as they say, a few words to the good connoisseur”.