Slowly But Surely

I read with interest your editorial about the Cardinal Newman Society, Measuring Catholic Identity (3/27). That organization does not seem to recognize the irony of choosing as their patron a holy priest who himself was the subject of much vilification and

Up So High

To say I have been profoundly moved by Nourishing Head and Heart, by Walter J. Burghardt, S.J., (3/20) is an understatement. Not since John Powell’s ministry lit a spiritual fire in me in the 1970’s has a Jesuit knocked me so flat and raised me up so high! If Walter

How to Help

I loved the editorial, The Meanest Cities (3/6). It reminded me of when I was stationed in New York City during one of the coldest periods in history and Mayor Edward Koch challenged the churches and synagogues to allow the homeless to sleep in these sacred places.

Truth of the Law

In the article A New Impediment (2/27), Msgr. Thomas D. Candreva writes concerning The Instruction on the Criteria of Vocational Discernment Regarding Persons With Homosexual Tendencies: This document, if I am not mistaken, establishes a new impediment to

Needs of Parishioners

While I agree with much of the assessment by the Rev. Frank D. Almade in Response to A Blueprint for Change’ (1/30), I believe that priests today do want to be leaders of the parish community. However, the lights, leaks, locks, loot and lawns can take an

Respectful Appreciation

In Aquinas in Africa (2/6), Thomas F. O’Meara, O.P., suggests that an African attitude toward technology and economic growth will influence how Africans think about Christianity. When I read this statement, it seemed to me that the opposite was true: that

Who Owns What?

Forgive me if I am confused on the current question of who owns and/or controls assets of Catholic parishes. Two items in the Signs of the Times section (2/6) seem to express contrasting viewpoints on this issue.

First, Archbishop John G. Vlazny of Portland,

Elucidation

Professor Lawrence S. Cunningham’s vignette on St. John of the Cross presented a streetwise poet-mystic-reformer (1/30). John’s friendship with St. Teresa of vila and her influence on him were also nicely presented. But St. John’s connections to the Society of Jesus

Imperial Presence

I write to commend the effort of Peter J. Donaldson (A Century Behind, 1/16) to present the situation of poverty and illiteracy in Burkina Faso, the former Upper Volta. His account gives urgency to the concerted effort to make poverty history in Africa. Africans

Now There’s a Fourth

Peter Heinegg’s perceptive review of Edmund Wilson: A Life in Literature (1/2) reminded me of an incident almost a half-century ago. I grew up a few miles from Talcottville, the upstate New York village where Wilson spent part of each year. As a