Correspondence
GILL, BARRY & Dick, Jack & KALES, JOYCE D. & NIEBRZYDOWSKI, CHRISTINE & Finn, James & Rosenthal, Peggy
Correspondence Tom Powers, farewell Battle Creek, Mich. To the Editors: Thomas Powers says "Farewell" [Mar. 11]. Though we have never met face-to-face, I have enjoyed his Commonweal...
...Now I recognize that an expression of wonderment is not yet a request for enlightenment, but I was immediately ready to regard it as such...
...It was changed so that we would not be mistaken as a chapter of Catholics for Free Choice - a national organization located in Washington, D.C...
...JAMES FINN 'Incredible penalty' Pittsburgh, Pa...
...He has been a compassionate companion...
...We may indeed be at the edge of civility's collapse-an age darker, more anxious, and more destructive than when our ancestors escaped to barren rocks along Europe's Atlantic coast...
...which attributes the post-Vatican II removal of bad religious art from churches to the 'heresy of Modernism' enjoying 'Satanic assistance...
...John Chrysostom when the petition is made ". . . let us commend ourselves and one another and our whole lives to Christ our God...
...We believe such behavior reflects misogyny and denies women the full richness of spiritual practice in that it does not treat them as full moral agents capable of making ethical decisions...
...To the Editors: You have flattered me by expressing public wonderment about my opinions [Editorial,"Sane Center or Just Anti-Left...
...but I hope he'll let us regular readers hear from him again in Commonweal from time to time...
...To the Editors: As a fellow Johnson-lover, I will miss Thomas Powers, though not for his conversational abilities, which I am sure I would enjoy if I were ever to meet him...
...in fact the intellectual integrity and courage that are behind his decision are exactly the qualities that have made his column extraordinary...
...He has never accepted facile or wish-fulfilling solutions to the deadly problems he has so boldly taken it upon himself to confront...
...Garvey pinpoints the problem - "Ego can convert absolutely anything to its own uses...
...But for all of us-who struggle with burnouts, bills, uncertain careers, growing kids, and this age's global anxieties-I hope he returns to these pages with his sensitive word and well-crafted phrase...
...I hope to be able to deal with the subject at a later date...
...JOYCE D. KALES A query answered New York, N.Y...
...To the Editors: In his column on contemporary religious problems and the attraction of cults for young people [Feb...
...PEGGY ROSENTHAL Religious commitment Hershey, Pa...
...Such a law and its penalty (which we view as unenforceable) shows a hierarchy attempting to tamper with the Catholic woman's conscience...
...BARRY GILL Great sense of loss Rochester, N.Y...
...Napa, Calif...
...Young people are attracted to cults led by charismatic leaders who ask for nothing less than total commitment and blind devotion...
...Powers's column has been one of the reasons that I've kept renewing my subscription to Commonweal...
...I certainly won't stop renewing now...
...An exception to the violations of ecclesiastic or sacramental laws is abortion...
...Women who have abortions and those who assist them are "automatically" excommunicated...
...To the Editors: I've just read Thomas Power's "By Way of Farewell...
...This too readily leads to cut-rate prophecy, which abounds in the religious marketplace today...
...Although I am critical of both abortion and antiseptic churches I (Continued on page 222) Correspondence (Continued from page 194) am always made uneasy by our contemporaries who, in highly particular terms, seem readily to discern in the affairs of humankind divine (or Satanic) intervention...
...Many established mainstream Protestant groups in contrast, ask little, and offer a "feel good" brand of comfortable religious humanism that has been rejected by many youths in search of an ideal...
...In a church where sovereignty of conscience exists it is incredible that such a penalty could be reaffirmed especially when one considers that the hierarchy holds the minority opinion in the abortion debate by believing that there are no circumstances that warrant abortion...
...The phenomenal growth shown by evangelical Christian sects indicates a hunger for total commitment and the guarantees offered of salvation to the "born-again...
...Does not being a Christian involve awakening to this straightforward commitment...
...CHRISTINE NIEBRZYDOWSKI President, Catholics for Choice P.S...
...Acts such as massacres, murder or torture do not warrant "automatic" excommunication...
...However, not to be disingenuous, I recognize that you have associated my name with these articles because you believe that what you term "the new Catholic 'anti-left' " has an allure-what a very odd notion - to which I have succumbed...
...I do respect his reasons for stopping the column...
...25], John Garvey does not specify the key element in any religious system-commitment...
...And statistics show us that approximately 2.1 million U.S...
...We have recently changed our name from Catholics for a Free Choice to Catholics for Choice...
...For example, this penalty applies to anyone who profanes the eucharist, to clerics who absolve the sins of their own sexual partners, to those who violate the confidentiality of confession, and to those who would ordain a bishop without approval from Rome...
...We believe that "automatic" excommunication for abortion is in direct contradiction with the Vatican II "declaration of Religious Liberty" in which it was stated "The Christian faithful have the civil right of freedom from interference in leading their lives according to their conscience...
...Most acts subject to this "automatic" excommunication are violations of ecclesiastic or sacramental laws...
...that we should seek the deepest roots of the wisdom of our tradition...
...Given the great diversity of Catholic opinion on abortion we feel it is cruel and wrong for the hierarchy to have such a penalty...
...Not about all of them, alas, only my opinions on two discrete items: "What does Mr...
...Though we have never met face-to-face, I have enjoyed his Commonweal comradeship...
...with a great sense of loss, [Mar...
...It is impossible to respond to this in brief compass...
...I will miss him-his knowledge and his sanity-and the same must be true for the mass of Commonweal subscribers, who are indicating by their continued support of the magazine that they value such writers as Powers...
...To the Editors: In a revision of canon statutes [Editorial "The New Code," Feb...
...Unfortunately, I had not read one of the articles referred to...
...We believe the intent of such a penalty is to harass, confuse and to deny Catholic women the right to use their consciences as their guide if they find abortion to be the right, moral and loving decision...
...I sympathize with his feeling of power-lessness...
...11] Pope John Paul II revised the number of offenses that call for" automatic" excommunication from thirty-seven to seven...
...Finn think of the nuclear-war-as-divine-punish-ment-for-abortion approach that we previously described" or "another article...
...Garvey seems to find authenticity in the Christianity of two Orthodox mentioned in his article, one a monk and the other a bishop...
...However, what is required is the willingness to suspend the evidence of science for the fundamentalist's interpretation of scripture...
...Even when close to despair, as he has sometimes sounded (wholly justifiably), he has kept a clear head and a sense of decency and fairness about his subjects...
...He also advises...
...Although the hierarchy in Rome declared that this new canon code was to be infused with the liberalizing spirit of Vatican II we do not view it as such...
...JACK DICK I will miss...
...We do, however, support the efforts of that organization and distribute their literature.anization and distribute their literature...
...Polls show that 77-79 percent of Catholics disagree with the hierarchical position by believing that a woman has a right to choose abortion in some or all circumstances...
...In Eastern Christianity's tradition, commitment is invited in the Divine Liturgy of St...
...Having now repaired my ignorance, I can respond to your question briefly: "Not much...
...No small achievement in this day of disequilibrium...
...Catholicism requires strong commitment but it has been largely to binding ecclesiastical norms: the church, papal infallibility, Mass on Sunday, prohibitions on artificial birth control - features which rebellious young people are inclined to ignore...
...I will miss his utterly lucid explanations of nuclear weaponry which, because of the way I use my own discretionary reading time, constitute almost the only reliable information I have on the subject...
...Catholic women have availed themselves of legal abortion since 1973...
Vol. 110 • April 1983 • No. 7
