Father Fessio' Obedience

I would like to add a footnote to the fine article “Father Fessio Barred at San Francisco College” by Tim Drake (March 24-30).

It is not widely known that Father Fessio was the founder, in the truest sense, of the American edition of Communio. A student and assistant of Father Henri de Lubac, he attended the meeting in Rome in the early '70s of a small group of theologians — including Henri de Lubac, Hans Urs von Balthasar and Joseph Ratzinger, among others — who issued in the founding of the review. He eventually contacted me (we had been classmates in the seminary) and a couple of others to help him organize an American edition. Having gotten the American edition underway, with James Hitchcock and Father John Sheets installed, respectively, as the first editor and first chairman of the board, Father Fessio moved on to his founding of Ignatius Press, Ignatius Institute and other works.

I mention this, inter alia, because, in the founding of Communio, Father Fessio manifested a quality to which all who know him well can attest: In the zeal and vigor with which he initiates such projects, he always puts them clearly and unequivocally in the service of the Church — and is quite free in turning over control to others. The same detachment from any desire for self-aggrandizement has informed his ever-present courage in defending what he judges to be the good of the Church.

All of which brings us to the present moment. It is not at all surprising to me, and I think again to anyone who knows him, that, in response to the injustice of being assigned by the California Jesuits to a hospital some 400 miles from Ignatius Press and the newly founded Campion College, Father Fessio simply obeyed, and began to look for the hand of God in his new work. His obedience confirms the integrity of the vocation of this man in his significant work for the Church in the United States.

If I may pass along a further anecdote in this connection: Several years ago, in Rome, I was involved in a short conversation with Cardinal Ratzinger in which Father Fessio's name came up. Cardinal Ratzinger remarked briefly as the conversation continued: “He is an obedient priest.” I have always been struck by that comment, and curious as to why that quality was singled out by the cardinal. I now have my answer, and know why the comment was so perceptive.

DAVID L. SCHINDLER Washington, D.C.

The author is editor of the North American edition of Communio and Dean of the John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and the Family at The Catholic University of America.

Archbishop Chaput's Chutzpah

I could hardly believe my eyes when I read the article in the April 21 issue where Archbishop Chaput calls Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia a “Cafeteria Catholic” like pro-abortionist Frances Kissling (“Denver's Archbishop Chaput: Cafeteria Catholicism Found in All Flavors,” April 21-27). I have long admired Archbishop Chaput and have hoped that someday he would be Pope! But this insult to Justice Scalia, a devout Catholic and our best hope for overturning Roe v. Wade, is outrageous. Frances Kissling is an excommunicated Catholic by her own choices and actions.

Archbishop Chaput needs to check the Catechism of the Catholic Church and the writings of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church who were virtually unanimous in their support for capital punishment.

The Catholic Church has always upheld the state's right to use the death penalty. In 1954, Pope Pius XII supported that right saying, “the effectiveness of vindictive penalties is in no way opposed to the function of punishment, which is the re-establishment and restoration of the order of justice.”

The fact that so many of our Church leaders are out there beating the drums for an end to capital punishment, which is given to very few hardened killers, when our nation has killed over 42 million babies through abortion, defies all logic. Never once have I heard a bishop come out and openly attack any pro-abortion Catholic by name! But to have an archbishop come out and compare Antonin Scalia to Frances Kissling makes my blood boil.

Archbishop Chaput, you owe Justice Scalia an apology!

MARY L. MYERS Mankato, Minnesota

The Church is a Wounded Healer

Many people, non-Catholics as well as Catholics, have reacted to the sex-abuse scandals with statements against the Church itself. One Catholic man who was interviewed said he would never participate in the sacrament of confession with a priest again. A women stated she just couldn't bring herself to attend church this Easter. Such attitudes and actions are not against the guilty priests or the bishops they serve under, but against the Church that Christ founded.

Jesus warned that weeds would be among the good fruits of his Church, the Body of which he is the Head. We are to leave the weeds, for final judgment is God's alone (Matthew 13). Jesus, who is fully man and fully God, selected imperfect men to be his Apostles. The first bishops of his one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church included Judas who betrayed him, Peter who denied him, and his Apostles who abandoned him. These sins of the first bishops of Christ's Church did not destroy it, for Christ promised that the gates of the netherworld would not prevail against his Church (Matthew 16).

I pray that Christians, especially Catholics, and people of all faiths do not use the sinful actions of some to try to tear down Christ's pilgrim Church on Earth. Such attempts by the media, people interviewed, even the victims of the sexual abuse, I believe, are immoral in the eyes of God. God knows the guilt of all those involved; he knows the suffering of all those involved. Only he can bring true healing and forgiveness if we seek his healing and forgiveness. Condemning or abandoning his Church will not bring about reconciliation. I pray that faith in God and the Church he established on Earth (although imperfect) will lead us all to the one, true, eternal, heavenly Church.

JOAN R. MORRIS Clarkesville, Georgia

No Compromise for Cardinal Law

I think it is good that Cardinal Bernard Law has decided not to resign. I say this because I believe him to be an orthodox prelate and I would not make that claim for every bishop in the American hierarchy. This does not mean that I support the way he has handled the sex-abuse crisis in his diocese. But I believe that he has handled this crisis no better or worse than any other bishop in the American Church. There appears to have been a sort of modus operandi in the way these cases were handled in the American Church.

With hindsight now, we can all look back and say that this was not the way to go since it involved the recycling of priestly abusers. But, in fairness, I do not believe that one Catholic bishop, in dealing with these cases, is guilty of any malfeasance. Each bishop who faced a sex-abuse claim had a very unpleasant task to deal with. A task which most of us, myself included, would not wish to deal with at all. These men had an impossible juggling act to accomplish — an alleged charge of sex abuse, a priest presumed to be innocent, the reputation of the Church, the Church's treasury, the salvation of souls.

Let us all, as Catholics, stop throwing rocks at the bishops for the manner, flawed as it was, in which these cases were handled. Let us move forward as a Church to reform the seminary system so that only orthodox, psychologically balanced and chaste young men can be accepted and trained as future priests. There can be no compromise on the necessity of absolute sexual abstinence for our priests. And only those who clearly have the charism of celibacy can be ordained as future priests. [Let there be] no compromise on the absolute necessity for our priests to be good and holy men, for they are a channel of God's grace.

PAUL A. TROUVE Montague, New Jersey

Praying for Priests

David Pearson's commentary on the present crisis in the Church was, indeed, most heartening and appreciated (“Pray for the Priesthood,” April 21-27). Loved the story of St. Francis kissing the hands of the sinner-priest because “those hands hold God.” Hopefully we all will do likewise by bringing all of our priests before Christ in prayer as he suggests — we need to allow God to work through the hands of our priests. The great miracle of transubstantiation, performed through the hands of our priests, allows the power and the grace of God to create the Eucharist for us. Yes! We need to pray for our priests — that they may be purified in body, mind, heart and soul through the water that flowed from the side of Christ at His crucifixion. Yes! I did pray for all of our priests today and will forevermore.

BOB BUNSA Basking Ridge, New Jersey