Italy ? A senior cardinal on Monday reaffirmed the celibacy rule for priests and played down the shortage that has left many churches without clergymen to celebrate Mass, saying at the start of a meeting of the world’s bishops that access to the Eucharist was a gift, not a right for Catholics.

Cardinal Angelo Scola, the key moderator of the Synod of Bishops, also reaffirmed that divorced people who remarry without getting an annulment cannot receive Communion. But he said the synod would have to study the issue and hinted that aspects of it should be reconsidered.

The comments by the Venice patriarch came in an introductory speech on the first day of the meeting on the Eucharist during which some 250 bishops from 118 countries will discuss issues surrounding the Mass and make recommendations to Pope Benedict XVI.