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Television
Reality and Morality
James Martin, S.J.
Each day The New York Times, like most newspapers, publishes a television listing that includes a rundown of the day’s movies. But unlike most newspapers, the Times offers its own quirky assessments of these films, with an admirable economy of words.The paper’s reviewers are generous to
Catholics in Political Life
Henry J. Hyde
The Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, headed by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, issued on Jan. 16 a document, dated Nov. 24, 2002, entitled “Doctrinal Note on Some Questions Regarding the Participation of Catholics in Political Life.” The note addresses some of the m
Justice and Equality
Robert F. Drinan
The intractable question of allowing affirmative action to be used in the selection of students for college admission will finally be settled by the United States Supreme Court. Two cases involving plaintiffs denied admission at the University of Michigan, allegedly because they are white, will be d
Books
A Sacred Trek
Olga Bonfiglio
For an on-the-ground feel for the Holy Land and the high stakes it holds for the world rsquo s three great religions Judaism Christianity and Islam Bruce Feiler rsquo s book Walking the Bible is the next best thing to being there The journalist-author takes readers on a guided tour of the first
Of Many Things
Of Many Things
George M. Anderson
Imagine a dark winter morning. A line of poorly dressed men—black, white, Latino—stretches alongside a 1920’s brick building on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. The building is the Holy Name Centre, and the men, most of them homeless, are waiting to take showers in the center&rsqu
The Word
No Problem!
Dianne Bergant
We have many expressions for assuring each other that the mistakes we have made will not be held against us The most familiar include ldquo I forgive you rdquo ldquo Don rsquo t worry about it rdquo ldquo That rsquo s O K rdquo and more recently ldquo No problem rdquo These are simpl
Letters
Letters
Our readers

Without Comment

I find it appalling that a letter in your Jan. 6 issue was published without an editor’s comment. The Rev. Alistair McKay says that the very lives of homosexual men are witness to selfishness and sterility, even those who are celibate and chaste. That is a gratuitous and totally unwarranted insult to every gay man in the world. How could you have published that without comment? The same applies to his question, How can homosexual priests proclaim the holiness of family life when their whole being is centered in attraction to others of the same sex? Father McKay’s very apparent homophobia prompts the unfounded and rash assumption that there are no homosexual priests (and never were any) who proclaim the holiness of family life. He then makes the totally illogical and unsubstantiated jump to the statement that barring homosexuals from the priesthood will help to restore faith in the Vatican and the U.S. hierarchy. Moreover, you helped to create a completely false notion by providing for his letter the caption, Restore Faith. It must have been a bad day in the editing department.

Peter M. Kopkowski

Film
A Liturgy of the Hours: The Hours
Richard A. Blake
‘Is there any place on campus where they recite the Liturgy of the Hours?” The two undergraduates who popped into the sacristy after one of those tiny mid-morning, midweek gatherings for Eucharist in a university chapel took me by surprise. Why would two young women want to squeeze one m
Books
A World Away
Tom Deignan
Alice McDermott rsquo s fiction like William Kennedy rsquo s is to be praised if for no other reason than that it transcends the tradition of Irish-American fiction established by James T Farrell back in the 1930 rsquo s Since Studs Lonigan first swaggered onto the literary stage Irish-America
Letters
Letters
Our readers

Prophet Remembered

The Dec. 29, 1990, issue of America (pg. 499) had an excellent comment on the Muslim world by John Alden Williams. I recently reread this editorial and discussed it with my family and friends. It is timely and timeless. It was also prophetic, as the events of 9/11 proved: A form of radical activist Islam has the potential to be much more fearful...because it would be driven by religious energies. Please consider reprinting it. Now, more than ever, we need the voice of prudence and wisdom.

Gerard C. Jebaily, M.D.

Columns
What a Laugh!
Terry Golway
Writing about television in a magazine that already publishes the elegant thoughts of James Martin, S.J., on the subject is fraught with peril, but I will proceed apace. From my perspective, comparison can inspire only humility, and that is not such a bad thing.   Humiliation, on the other hand
The Times and Sexual Abuse by Priests
Andrew M. Greeley
The New York Times labored mightily to bring forth a mountain of priest abusers in its recent census and produced only a mouse, as it admitted in the 12th paragraph of its sensationalist prose in “Decades of Damage” (1/12/03). The Times reported a percent of American priests not greatly
Books
Carbide's Deadly Mistake
Olga Bonfiglio
At a time when the news is saturated with stories about corporate malfeasance it is salutary to recall that the corporate quest for profits can sometimes lead to injury and death In Five Past Midnight in Bhopal Dominique Lapierre and Javier Moro resurrect the story of Bhopal India where in 1984
News
Signs of the Times
From AP, CNS, RNS, Staff and other sources
Growing List of Church Leaders, Groups Oppose War in IraqAs the threat of war in Iraq loomed larger, Christian leaders and associations across the world urged restraint on the use of force and warned of a humanitarian disaster if the country is attacked. From Catholic bishops to interchurch coalitio
Faith in Focus
That's Love
Alma Roberts Giordan
My late husband and I often caught the tail end of a popular television talk show while we were waiting for the news to begin. One evening Tao, a guest of one of the hostesses, got into an animated dialogue over the definition of love. A beautiful actress, whose name escapes me, painted that virtue
The Rising of Bruce Springsteen
Patrick Kelly
I believe in the love that you gave me,
Separate Is Sometimes Better: A case study of a single-sex Catholic high school
John W. Donohue
When 2002 began, there were in the United States approximately 86,000 public schools, elementary and secondary. But from sea to shining sea, according to a count made by the Brighter Choice Foundation in Albany, N.Y., only 11 of these schools qualified for the rather clunky label “single-sex p
The Word
Not in My Neighborhood!
Dianne Bergant
Sometimes we may be willing to support good works as long as they are not set up in our neighborhood It may be true that property value plummets when someone opens a halfway house or a hospice around the corner This decline in value may also happen when the owners of that trendy ethnic restaurant
Books
Statesman and Strategist
Nancy J. Curtin
Winston Churchill is defined by historyhe studied it he wrote it and he made it While the notion that great men shape the course of human events is somewhat outmoded among professional historians Churchill transformed Britain rsquo s darkest hour in 1940 into its finest Inspiring Britons with hi
FaithOf Many Things
Of many things: Longing for nature
Drew Christiansen
When I returned last fall to New York City after 30 years away, what demanded the most adjustment for me was the absence of light. "Welcome to New York," I was told. The deprivation of daylight is one of the things New York apartment-dwellers have to endure.