1Peter5, Maike Hickson: Bishop Schneider quotes Pope John Paul II’s Familiaris Consortio (FC) on this matter, which states that such couples “are unable to be admitted thereto, since their state and their condition of life objectively contradict that union of love between Christ and the Church signified and effected by the Eucharist. There is another special pastoral reason: if these people were admitted to the Eucharist, the faithful would be led into error and confusion regarding the Church’s teaching on the indissolubility of marriage. Reconciliation in the sacrament of Penance – which opens the way for the sacrament of the Eucharist – can only be granted to those who have repented for having violated the sign of the covenant and of fidelity to Christ, they are sincerely ready to undertake a way of life no longer in contradiction with the indissolubility of marriage. This means, in practice, that when a man and a woman, for serious motives – such as, for example, the education of children – can not satisfy the obligation to separate, they ‘take on the duty to live in complete continence, by abstinence from the acts proper to spouses.’” (FC, n. 84) More on this here.
