Correspondence
IIIII IIIII III I Correspondence Thanks for Kting Erie, Pa. To the Editors: Thank you for the article, "Dying with Christian Dignity," by Hans Kiing (Jan. 27). I found very meaningful...
...I have seen patronizing, ignorant, .morally superior Birthright people, and, believe me, I'd never turn to them for help or send a friend of mine...
...The abortionists concentrate on the woman...
...p. 205, They are not shameful women, and they Americans Before Columbus (National Indian are certainly not statistics...
...As amother, I have learned principally one thing, humility and a healthy lack of surprise at all the vagaries of human behavior, my own above all...
...Copyright _9 1984 Commonweal Publishing Co...
...Everyone is trying to do the pregnant woman a favor, and none of us needs such friends...
...p. 199, Valerry...
...I always remember the image of the woman about to be stoned for adultery, and Jesus in a most compassionate act saving her...
...Where was her coadulterer and where are these new fathers of these aborted babies...
...Please take a look at that woman pregnant, alone, and facing such a life...
...but they need to be recognized and aired, for there can be no resurrection without the accompanying calvary...
...p. 203 & cover, p. 207, from Indian round, Oklahoma, in Joseph Campbell, The deprive them of their faces and names...
...And are we able tO truly understand and forgive a woman who has had an abortion...
...And, finally, we must realize we are all capable of doing evil...
...We all kill and are capable of killing whether it be legalized or not, whether it be through abortion, capital punishment, war, felony drunk driving, concentration camps, indifference to famine, etc...
...And, as a mother, I write and say I am not surprised that women seek abortions...
...The abortionists have depersonalized the process by calling the baby fetal tissue, and the pro-lifers have done just as badly bymaking the woman merely a recipient or host Womb to be as conveniently unburdened as the abortionists want to do, only they want to do it a mere nine months later down the road...
...It is the letters of Dr...
...iam fired...
...p. 201, Bas...
...SISTER ROSEMARY BRAEGER, O.S.B...
...Giving life is a terrible, terrible gift...
...Illustration: Cover, Hy Rosen, Albany TimesUnion & Dick Adair, Honolulu Advertiser...
...They are strangely silent...
...I am constantly aware of my limitations, follies, my meanness, and yet, my ability to transcend...
...Microfilm from V ol...
...Killing is part of the human malaise, only now we seem to be surprised and horrified that women are doing the killing...
...Let us not deprive them of the integrity of their suffering and its mystery, and above all, let us not to mind James Burtchaell's excellent article in the same issue on "A New Pastoral Method of Theology" for on no other single topic have I witnessed such a discrepancy between our professed belief in the sanctity of life and our actual treatment of the women involved...
...There is a new phenomenon in America aptly called the feminization of poverty...
...To the Editors: I am at this moment, above all, a tired mother as I write in response to the letters concerning abortions and Mary Beth Gordon's friend found in your January 27 issue...
...Pregnancy is a time of great stress, of biological upheaval, and add to that often the threat of abandonment or the withdrawal of affection by family or the biological consort...
...Serials Data program No.: ISSN 0010-3330...
...I sometimes wish my mothering role would disappear, but those moments are fleeting...
...We have simplified and glorified the mothering role with beautiful, meaningless clichSs.The reality is much more magnificent and simultaneously much less wonderful...
...I am always intrigued by the tales of various acts of charity being foisted upon the poor by well meaning do-gooders, and the resultant shock and dismay when the poor turn and spit in their benefactors' eyes with great contempt and walk off with the goodies...
...48106 and on Microfiche from Bell & Howell, Micro-Photo Division, Old Mansfield Road, Wooster Ohio 44691...
...I find we need to celebrate life ritually an~l symbolically, but we must include both the pain and the promise...
...This also calls Youth Council...
...The issue violates the intrinsic unity between mother and in-utero child...
...It seems to me parenting encapsulates the total human dimension from suffering to glory...
...Pregnant women are simply no better or worse than any other segment of humanity and are certainly not privy to any superior code of behavior than any other person...
...here those of the pro-life stance, to be stalwart, morally indignant, singulaxly without compassion, and therefore, totally uncompelling as persuasive forces to change any behavior whatsoever...
...I can understand and taste her (Continued on page 223) 1 Commonweal is indexed in Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature, Catholic Periodical Index, Index of American Periodical Verse, Book Review Digest and Book Review Index...
...And both are wrong...
...The only thing I can do is recognize my own impoverishment of spirit, my own ability to commit the same acts, and be grateful I have not been driven to do the same...
...How can we fail to understand the pain...
...the pro-lifers on the child...
...Mahood, Punch...
...I can simply hear no more fight thinking on either side of the abortion issue...
...Maillet and J. Martin Green, those final bland ripples that have reached shore and budged my tiny pebble...
...Women and children are the new poor in this land and are condemned to misery and degradation in substandard jobs and conditions...
...I found very meaningful Father Kiing's explanation of Christian dying as an integral part of the Christian's living relationship to the Creator...
...I find both sides, and particular...
...p. 208...
...Way of the Animal Powers (Harper & Row...
...And so I'd like to say, yes, care about the unborn child, but cry with the mother, suffer with her...
...It is the most awesome thing that has ever happened to me, and I am not speaking of the mere act of delivery, but it appears we have made pregnancy and motherhood a sacred cow, a false idol...
...With all the emphasis on the abortion, we seem to have forgotten this happens to real suffering women, not just to aborted babies...
...Let us not deprive pregnant women of their suffering with easy solutions on both sides...
...Cry with the mother Sonoma, Calif...
...1, 1924, to current issues available through University Microfilm, 300 N. Zeeb Road, Ann Arbor, Mi...
...Commonweal: 194...
...Second-class postage paid at New York, N.Y...
...None of us is blameless...
Vol. 111 • April 1984 • No. 7
