LETTERS
2002 LETTERS
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ROAMIN' CATHOLIC
Contents © 2002
by Jim Holman.
All rights reserved.
LETTERS
JUNE 2002
WHY ALWAYS MCBRIEN?
It's shameful enough that we have to suffer Richard McBrien's predictably trumpeted disobedience. (And, yes, [re: Canon 750, Paragraph 2] I mean disobedient, regarding matters of morality that have been "definitively proposed"), but can you at least get the name of the school right? Since 1842 it has been (officially) University of Notre Dame du Lac, or University of Notre Dame, or simply Notre Dame, but never Notre Dame University. McBrien's high media profile is quite distressing to some of us alumni. We are the only outstanding Catholic university in the country -- certainly the only one in the academic Top 20 -- that still has a chapel in every dormitory (all of them single-sex, unlike Boston College and Georgetown, for example), strictly enforced parietals, and a refreshingly pro-active pro-life student body, one that unanimously attends Mass during a time when most their peers fall away. So what's the media face on Our Lady's school? Always, the unhappy apostate McBrien. This is all the more vexing because there are, incidentally, orthodox Catholic priests in the C.S.C. order. McBrien should wonder why the media always want to talk to him, and never to them.
Gregory Solman,
Los Angeles
IF HEADS MUST ROLL
I have been a faithful reader for some years and I applaud your firm stand against the evils that have afflicted our Church and our society. It is my opinion that our Church has merely reflected the rot that has affected our society. The latest scandals afflicting our Church could not have existed without the formative influences exerted on the hierarchy of the Church during the decades of the 60s, 70s and 80s. This homosexual, humanist underground within the Church must be destroyed, root and branch, if the Church has any hope of regaining the credibility that it once took for granted. Obviously this rot has extended into the highest levels of the Church: witness the shame of a pedophile bishop in Florida. Does the rot extend higher? If heads must roll, then start cutting, until the rot is excised and we are down to good wood.
If we are to rebuild the priesthood, a young man must once again see the role model that he would emulate and not have to fear for his virtue in the very seminary. We have the God-given right to true teaching and to holy priests, and the time has come to start standing up for that right. All this talk about "diversity" and "compassion for those in the homosexual lifestyle," spewed by the likes of Father Liuzzi and his ilk, merely masks a cancer that only radical surgery will cure. Holy Scripture is quite clear on the punishments forthcoming for sodomy and the corruption of the innocent. It is the job of the Church to admonish and correct the sinner, not to assist in the concealment of his sin.
David D. Jones,
Inyokern
ECHOES OF DOSTOEVSKY
You are certainly more ultra-Catholic than the Grand Inquisitor, but could you occasionally refer to Christ's Gospel?
A Priest
YOU DON'T CARE
If you care so much about our Church, why tear it down so often because it doesn't agree with your right-wing opinion?
anonymous
PAPER AND READERSHIP MAKE AN IMPACT
Enclosed is my $10 subscription for this year. Until now I have been receiving the paper for free, for which I thank you. Although your paper, of course, has its flaws, I am glad it exists, if for no other reason than that it is a strong conservative Catholic voice in the Los Angeles archdiocese. I realized this when I read, in the May 2002 edition, the archdiocesan e-mails, some of which mentioned the paper, one calling it a "right wing throwaway newspaper." Be that as it may, clearly they are aware of your existence and of your readership and are not content simply to ignore you. Thus, you must be making an impact.
Mark Johnson,
Glendale
TO MAGGIE GARCIA
I just realize that you are a bigot and you use your pen to teach hate. You must indeed be a very sad person -- may God show you some mercy. No more hate! It is wrong! Stop the hate!
Tito
THE CROSS SHOULDN'T DISAPPOINT
I see the new cathedral fleetingly from the freeway when I drive downtown to go to abortion clinics. I keep telling myself not to complain. Be glad it's a monument to Christianity that's going up over the City of Fallen Angels. It could be a monument to the vices that really move this city. No, that's a cross up there, that beautiful symbol, not just of virtue, but of the victory of virtue.
So why didn't they put the cross on top of the building, where a victor stands? Why is it down the slope of the roof a ways? And it's stunted. It's too thin, the top is too short, and the horizontal is too long. It doesn't strike the clear, clean note it should strike.
I don't know how the real cross upon which Jesus was tortured looked, but we have grown up with a certain shape. It's a symbol; it's not a replica. Such a symbol isn't just for the intellect. It brings about an emotional response. The cross, of all things, shouldn't disappoint. I ask the cardinal to reconsider that cross on the cathedral. Let it represent victory, something handsome on the top of the hill.
Joe O'Brien
SAFER THAN ASPIRIN?
The morning-after pill is "safer than taking aspirin," as some claim? Since when does aspirin cause breast cancer? The preponderance of studies researching the correlation between breast cancer and the pill, which would include Previn, has been established. Those risks are even greater if the concentration of synthetic hormones is higher, which is exactly the case with the morning-after pill.
How can a woman "accidentally" get pregnant? It is not as if one doesn't know what causes pregnancy, and if one is so stupid as not to know, what will guarantee she will be smart enough to take the two pills, which must be ingested twelve hours apart, correctly?
As there most likely won't be any parental supervision required, many girls may end up using this form of birth control multiple times, wreaking unknown havoc on their still-developing bodies.
What about the mandatory counseling? Is the pharmacist going to take the time to do this? How adequately? They will be required to fill out "encounter forms," containing questions about sexual activity, such as the number of partners within the previous six months; and birth control methods, like how frequently they use condoms.
The pills are not cheap: prices range from $35-$70 without a prescription.
To call it "emergency contraception" is a misnomer. In addition to countering the fertilization of the egg, it also causes an egg that does become fertilized and attaches to the uterine wall to be expelled. This is not contraception, but abortion.
Tesa Becica,
Van Nuys
HOMOSEXUALITY IS NOT LIKE ALCOHOLISM
It is a fact that a male who gets sexual pleasure out of another male, no matter what his age, is a homosexual by definition. The scandal of pedophile priest has two basic reasons: after Vatican II, the Church let men who were homosexuals become priests; and the Catholic Church, in emulation of our founder, is in the forgiveness business in a big way. Let me explain.
Seventy years ago, when I was a boy, the problem was alcoholic priests. In those days, when a priest was found to be an alcoholic, he was forgiven after he went to confession and promised to stay off alcohol. He was transferred to another parish and in extreme cases was told not to say Mass anymore. But homosexuality is not like alcoholism. With the latter you can stay away from that which makes you sin. But sex is the be all and end all of homosexuality, and sexual pleasures are what the active homosexual lives for. What worked for 2000 years for celibate priest didn't work when they allowed homosexuals to become priests; and over 90% of the victims of pedophile priests are teen-aged boys.
George Noonan,
Sylmar