A priest has taken the unusual step of telling his congregants that their political support may determine whether or not they can receive communion.

From the AP:

A South Carolina Roman Catholic priest has told his parishioners that they should refrain from receiving Holy Communion if they voted for Barack Obama because the Democratic president-elect supports abortion, and supporting him “constitutes material cooperation with intrinsic evil.”

The Rev. Jay Scott Newman said in a letter distributed Sunday to parishioners at St. Mary’s Catholic Church in Greenville that they are putting their souls at risk if they take Holy Communion before doing penance for their vote.

“Our nation has chosen for its chief executive the most radical pro-abortion politician ever to serve in the United States Senate or to run for president,” Newman wrote, referring to Obama by his full name, including his middle name of Hussein.

“Voting for a pro-abortion politician when a plausible pro-life alternative exits constitutes material cooperation with intrinsic evil, and those Catholics who do so place themselves outside of the full communion of Christ’s Church and under the judgment of divine law. Persons in this condition should not receive Holy Communion until and unless they are reconciled to God in the Sacrament of Penance, lest they eat and drink their own condemnation.”

During the 2008 presidential campaign, many bishops spoke out on abortion more boldly than four years earlier, telling Catholic politicians and voters that the issue should be the most important consideration in setting policy and deciding which candidate to back. A few church leaders said parishioners risked their immortal soul by voting for candidates who support abortion rights.

But bishops differ on whether Catholic lawmakers — and voters — should refrain from receiving Communion if they diverge from church teaching on abortion. Each bishop sets policy in his own diocese. In their annual fall meeting, the nation’s Catholic bishops vowed Tuesday to forcefully confront the Obama administration over its support for abortion rights.

According to national exit polls, 54 percent of Catholics chose Obama, who is Protestant. In South Carolina, which McCain carried, voters in Greenville County — traditionally seen as among the state’s most conservative areas — went 61 percent for the Republican, and 37 percent for Obama.

“It was not an attempt to make a partisan point,” Newman said in a telephone interview Thursday. “In fact, in this election, for the sake of argument, if the Republican candidate had been pro-abortion, and the Democratic candidate had been pro-life, everything that I wrote would have been exactly the same.”

There’s more background at the link. And you can read his letter to the faithful at his parish website. (It also turns out he has his own blog.) I have a feeling we haven’t heard the last about this.

UPDATE: Indeed, we haven’t heard the last. The pastor in question has released a statement:

Last Wednesday morning I received five written questions about last week’s bulletin column from the Greenville News, and I answered those questions in writing. The third question asked “Are you saying that you’ll administer a no-communion policy unless Obama voters partake in penance?” Here is my answer:

“I cannot and will not refuse Holy Communion to anyone because of his or her political opinions or choices, even as I continue to teach what the Church teaches about the necessity of being in full, visible communion with the Church before receiving the sacraments. Only those who believe what the Catholic Church teaches and who seek to live according to that teaching should even be interested in receiving the sacraments of the Church, and on the question of the intrinsic and grave evil of abortion, there is and can be no doubt about what the Church teaches.”

Check out the link at Rocco’s for the rest.

Meantime, Fr. Newman’s boss — the administrator for his diocese — has “repudiated” the remarks of the priest:

Msgr. (Martin) Laughlin said that Father Newman’s comments “diverted the church’s clear teaching on abortion” by pulling it into the “partisan political arena.”

Quoting the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Msgr. Laughlin said that Christ gives everyone “the freedom to explore our own conscience and to make our own decisions while adhering to the law of God and the teachings of the faith.”

“Therefore, if a person has formed his or her conscience well, he or she should not be denied Communion, nor be told to go to confession before receiving Communion,” he said.