Understated Fact

Father Raymond J. de Souza’s analysis, “Spotlight on Sexual Abuse” (In Depth, March 20 issue) on the important film Spotlight, unfortunately, understates our Church’s responsibility to carefully screen our priestly vocations and to act promptly and justly in responding to evil. A major limitation in the film’s development is the failure to acknowledge that more than 80% of the abusive victims were adolescents, and the abuse was directly related to the ordination of homosexual men.

Tragically, that is still occurring; and even more tragically, homosexual clergy continue to be in positions of privilege and power in our Church. Let’s truly address this issue and discontinue looking outward.

Edward J. FitzPatrick

Orangeburg, New York

 

Height of Haughtiness

Relative to Robert Royal’s commentary “Father Berrigan Found Fame in the Pursuit of Justice” (In Depth, May 29 issue): Royal notes that “Father [Daniel] Berrigan remarked that he would not die for the Eucharist, except in an ‘extraordinarily secularized kind of context’” — whatever that means, esoteric and obscure, like his poetry. Indeed, it is odd and arrogant, as Royal comments.

I often thought that Berrigan’s Masses were not valid, as he made up all the prayers, but for the words of institution, which is the height of clericalism: “I can do anything I want. I’m the priest.” No humility there. Yet Dorothy Day wrote: “The Mass is the most important thing that we do.”

Once, when he was invited to say Mass at the Catholic Worker in New York, he used a ceramic coffee cup. Dorothy, who happened to be there, quietly went up to the table after he finished and took the cup and buried it in the back yard.

In the December 1972 issue of The Catholic Worker newspaper, on the front page, she wrote “A Letter to Father Daniel Berrigan,” in which she affirmed: “[A]nd so when it comes to divorce, birth control and abortion, I must write in this way. The teaching of Christ, the Word, must be upheld. ... I believe in the sacraments. I believe grace is conferred in the sacraments.”

She was very unhappy with the violent turn of the Vietnam anti-war protests and the destruction of property in the name of “nonviolence.” For her funeral Mass in December 1980, her daughter, Tamar Hennessy, insisted that I be the celebrant. I invited Father Berrigan to concelebrate, but he didn’t show up.

Geoffrey Gneuhs

New York, New York

 

Editor’s note: The writer served as chaplain to Dorothy Day and the New York Catholic Worker movement. He currently serves on the board of the Dorothy Day Guild.

 

Good Stewardship

I have seen a number of letters criticizing the Register for its coverage of “Climate Change and the Church” (Nov. 29 issue), but only one had any substance, and this was Joe Marincel’s letter titled “Focus on Faith and Morals.” Consequently, I want to state why “climate change” is a moral issue that is rooted in the same recklessness and relativism that Mr. Marincel writes about. First, I encourage readers to read Laudato Si, as well as Caritas in Veritate by Pope Benedict XVI.

The created world is for ours to steward and care for. We are not allowed to abuse it for short-term self-interest, because doing so will have long-term consequences. Mr. Marincel correctly states how moral relativism has led to social breakdown and chaos. However, consider how we live in vast suburbs, where few of us know, or care to know, our neighbors.

In the 1960s, only southern California was like this, but now this energy-demanding and isolating lifestyle is nationwide. If our consumer-driven, capitalist culture is driven by instant gratification and having things “on demand,” why should we be surprised that we have terms like “choice” (infanticide), “death with dignity” (suicide) and “marriage equality”? For some reason, we consider self-interest and profit as virtues. Pope Francis has focused on how a self-centered lifestyle — that many of us have failed to realize — is opposed to the Gospel.

Francis Jacobson

Bainbridge Island, Washington

 

Making Saints

I grew up watching Fulton J. Sheen and his spectacular TV broadcasts. My mother, two sisters and I watched these shows, along with our father, who was not a Catholic.

We all got so much pleasure and encouragement in our faith. My father especially enjoyed his shows. It took my dad many years to become a Catholic, but he finally did.

I am deeply troubled that the question of making Fulton J. Sheen a saint lies between two dioceses who are fighting for the rights to bury him and to get claim to his sainthood (“Progress on Archbishop Sheen’s Cause, June 26 issue).

To the ordinary Catholic like me, who eats up all knowledge of our faith, I could care less who gets the credit for his sainthood. I just want it to happen. I have watched EWTN for years and have been enriched in my faith. I hope that Fulton J. Sheen and Mother Mary Angelica are proclaimed saints. Mother has truly enriched my life, from her TV show on EWTN.

It all seems very political, rather than whether a person deserves to be made a saint. In my view, they both should be designated saints. Perhaps both can be canonized at the same time. I am 82 years old and would like all of this to take place before I die.

Mary Caroline Van Sant Zurun

Annandale, Virginia

 

Seminary Sadness

Regarding “Philadelphia’s St. Charles Borromeo Seminary Plans to Move” (NCRegister.com, June 21):

It is with a saddened heart that I read of the necessity to close this beautiful seminary, as when we lived in the Philadelphia area in the mid-’60s and early ’70s, we often drove past and remarked on the beauty of the seminary and its campus/grounds. But the times have changed. I was pleased to read of the recent increase in vocations, but I understand the dilemma, financial and otherwise.

I will pray for the Philadelphia community.

Ann Forsyth

Germantown, Tennessee