Lord Patten of Barnes cited the example of parents unable to receive the Eucharist when their children made their first Holy Communion.

"I've been thinking about that recently because one of my grandsons is about to be prepared for Communion. His parents are both married, neither of them divorced.

"But in his class what happens if there's one child whose parents are divorced and all the children are being advised to take first Communion with their parents," he told The Tablet.

"How do you explain to a seven or eight year old that his parents can't receive Communion with him or her because they're terrible sinners. I mean, where is St Matthew's Gospel in all that?"

Lord Patten added: "I hope to see change. I think a combination of greater forgiveness, in some cases more flexibility and in some cases change."

The issue of pastoral care of divorced and civilly remarried Catholics is expected to be one of the topics under discussion at October's synod on the family.

Lord Patten, who is chancellor of Oxford University, recently oversaw a review of the Vatican's media strategy.

He praised Pope Francis for "heroically" opening up a debate about "whether the Church should adapt itself more to take account of contemporary realities or whether it should hold fast to an unchanging magisterium".

"Should the Church accept congregations becoming smaller providing it can give a clear message and a clear sense of destiny or should it try to adjust itself without losing the fundamentals of the Christian message?" he asked,

A former chairman of the BBC, Lord Patten said that many Catholics had been at odds with Church teaching over contraception and homosexuality for some time.

Sources

• The Tablet
• Image: Oxford Martin School

Lord Patten, head of a Vatican Media Committee formed to recommend reforms, said the Holy See needs better capability to respond to a constant news cycle and in different languages.

"What is needed now is more visual, multi-media content, especially if one wishes to reach younger people," he said.

About 85 per cent of the net cost of the Vatican's media outlay goes on newspapers and radio, Lord Patten noted.

Television and social media resources are professionally run, but under-resourced.

But Lord Patten warned that reforming Vatican media could see individuals who had long enjoyed effective autonomy very likely finding it hard to adapt to being accountable to others.

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