Correspondence
MERTZ, (REV.) FRED & BAKER, EDWARD J. & GOW, HAVEN BRADFORD & MAKLETZOFF, ANN HARRIGAN & DAWES, (REV.) GREG
Correspondence Hans on deck St. Paul, Minn. To the Editors: I hate that phrase "I can't believe," but anyway, I can't believe that your contributors, giving a list of "recommended works in...
...Otherwise, the state and religion would be aliens to each other - hostile, suspicious, and even unfriendly," Mr...
...To the Editors: Re the April 8 article on tuition tax credits: Clearly, much of the opposition to tuition tax credits for private and parochial schools is based on a misguided and pernicious misinterpretation of the First Amendment, one that demands a strict and total separation of church and state...
...REV...
...Powers ever feels that the time has come to "pack up and head off for New Zealand" (and I hope and pray that such a time will never come), then we will make him welcome...
...The sanctity of life is preeminent among these EDWARD J. BAKER No neutrality doctrine Arlington Heights, 111...
...Niebryzydowski's misinformed opinion about canon law...
...Both women pioneered in creating new patterns where lay people could work independently of the hierarchy though always loyal to the church (not mandated, as were the rest of the many Catholic action groups then flourishing in the U.S...
...For this I am grateful...
...All our policies and programs were directed toward it, in the context of our Catholic beliefs Long before - twenty-five years before, in fact - even the term "civil rights ' was used, we Commonweal welcomes letters on subjects treated in its pages...
...Bishops' statement on race in 1958 finally said out loud, "The heart of the race question is moral and religious," and I'm convinced that the twenty years of grueling effort that Friendship House workers had already spent trying to awaken Catholic consciences about racism had some measure of influence...
...All of this in addition to the basic fact that moral truth is never determined by popular consensus...
...GREG DAWES One for the record Notre Dame, Ind To the Editors: I want to lay a ghost of long standing, once and for all, viz, that Friendship House is a branch or "offshoot" of the C.W...
...Supreme Court Justice William Douglas observed in the 1952 case of Zorach v Clauson: "The First Amendment does not say that in every and all respects there shall be a separation of church and state...
...FRED MERTZ Polls apart Flushing, N.Y...
...Both began about the same time, Day in 1933 in New York, de Hueck in 1934 in Toronto (June 24, 1934...
...The popular inclination to insult rather than understand the church's teaching is reflected in Ms...
...The typical American Catholic tolerates and participates in a lot of anti-Christian behavior from racism to violence, from pornography to marital infidelity, and on a given occasion will call these things the "right, moral and loving decision ". The typical American Catholic could not fill up sixty seconds lecturing on everything he or she knows about the faith...
...Christine Niebrzydowski, Letters, April 8...
...or "Catholic Worker - inspired " Friendship House is not and never was thus connected...
...Ex-communicative penalties are imposed when there are no statutes from secular society to cause the individual to think twice about his or her behavior...
...Justice Douglas added: "We are a religious people whose institutions presuppose a Supreme Being ." The Founding Fathers intended the First Amendment not to safeguard society or the state from the influence of religion but, rather, to preserve and protect religious liberty from encroachments by the state...
...We in the two movements frequently visited and broke bread with one another, helped and supported each other in many ways...
...But, as the late U.S...
...more structured than the C.W., less structured than the religious life, roughly speaking • organization - local branch heads were in charge of staff, programs and policies, and they in turn were responsible to the national director who had authority over all operations...
...This, however, does not preclude the realization that, as Christians, we have chosen to make a special commitment to forming that conscience on Christian precepts...
...does precisely what, for example, Robert Egan mentions, "Catholic theologians enter into dialogue with various philosophical points of view - Hegel, Marx, Whitehead, etc...
...The U.S...
...This is precisely what Kung does, uniting all kinds of modern (and semi-modern) points of view around the idea of God's existence Heck, you could skip most of the rest of the books, and read Does God Exist...
...There are two one-line references to Friendship House in the book: • " The Baroness de Hueck's Friendship House, the interracial movement that started as an offshoot of the Catholic Worker " (p 129) • " he (Merton) had worked in Baroness de Hueck's Catholic Worker-inspired Friendship House for a period " (p 221) (I was working at Harlem Friendship House when Merton came, and the "period" was 3 or 4 days, finishing with Father Furfey's retreat on the lay vocation he made with us, and announcing the next day his decision to go to Gethsemane Abbey ). There were, of course, similarities between the Catholic Worker and Friendship House, but as I know from spending ten years on the Friendship House staff (1938-1948), the differences are basic, and may be briefly summarized thus: • lay apostolate - we struck out in an entirely new direction, experimenting in a form of lay Catholic action without precedent...
...I do agree that I don't know or appreciate the work of Samuel Johnson, but perhaps we Commonweal readers have (unconsciously) absorbed a little of his spirit...
...He didn't provide us with easy answers, but then people in search of easy answers don't read Commonweal...
...But perhaps something more: perhaps the stubborn conviction that conversations in drawing rooms can make a difference, the conviction (against all odds) that reasonable and humane people can search together for solutions to some of our failures, and that this kind of reasonable discussion can make a difference...
...probably two of the most outstanding religious women of twentieth century America...
...Consequently, they wanted government to be the champion and defender of religion and religious freedom...
...The First Amendment scholar O. Carroll Arnold rightly observes: "One would never dream of asserting that the government is neutral toward freedom of speech or the press, and it is (or at least should be) equally non-neutral toward religion and religious freedom " HAVEN BRADFORD GOW Topics which matter Invercargill, New Zealand To the Editors: I've just received the March 11 issue of Commonweal containing Thomas Powers's column "By Way of Farewell " (Surface mail to New Zealand takes a little time...
...If Mr...
...Yes, certainly "an uneasy sense of public failure," as Mr...
...ANN harrigan makletzoff Cushwa Center for American Catholic History University of Notre Dameican Catholic History University of Notre Dame...
...To the Editors: I hate that phrase "I can't believe," but anyway, I can't believe that your contributors, giving a list of "recommended works in contemporary philosophy and theology" [April 8], omit Hans Kung's Does God Exist...
...Continued on page 413) Correspondence (Continued from page 386) Powers for his column...
...And they arrived at their vision separately, each in her own individual way...
...Letters of not more than 250 or 300 words naturally have a better chance of being published took our courage in our hands and publicized the scandal of institutionalized racism in the church...
...I'm not sure if I fit his description of the Commonweal reader, being a young Catholic priest who doesn't smoke (and never has) or have children (in fractions or whole units...
...The public confusion about these two movements happened possibly because of some similarities or coincidences Dorothy Day and Catherine de Hueck were both dynamic, charismatic personalities...
...To the Editors: When will we hear an end to the silly argument that a Catholic should have the right to choose to abort a life because some pollster claims a majority of "American Catholics" believe it's all right [Ms...
...Powers suggests...
...But he did provide us with a little reasonable and humane discussion in recent years on an issue which concerns the survival of us all...
...The church has always rightly taught that God ultimately judges us, in terms of salvation, by our fidelity to our individual conscience...
...But self-criticism, public admission of faults, was a no-no in those days...
...In a sense, it is an honor to have Friendship House confused with the u-niquely beautiful Catholic Worker movement, but I just want to set the record straight...
...How much is yet to be told...
...Kung in Does God Exist...
...What distinguishes the Commonweal reader...
...So we are happy to exercise some of our 'discretionary feelings' in reading Commonweal, which specializes in drawing room conversations of extraordinary breadth on topics which do matter to ordinary people...
...REV...
...The latest error repeated in M. Piehl's book, Breaking Bread (reviewed by James O'Gara, May 6) impels me to try to straighten the record...
...They believed that a society's public morality depends upon a religious foundation, and that the beneficial influence of religion on private and public morality is indispensable to the maintenance of good government and the survival of self-government...
...So I, for one, would like to thank Mr...
...Each Catholic Worker house was autonomous, functioning more like an organism, its adherents being free to follow, or not to follow, its local customs and rules • Civil Rights was our single, exclusive goal, to which everything else was subordinated...
Vol. 110 • July 1983 • No. 13
