Correspondence
GALLO, NADINE & WARD, GEORGE E. & MENDUS, BILL & MATTHIESEN, (MOST REV.) LEROY T. & O'CONNOR, ROD & COULSON, J. D. & CREEL, RITA C. & POLICANO, JOSEPH D.
To the Editors Original originalist Regarding Julia Vitullo-Martin's "Justice & Antonin Scalia" (March 28): I do not believe that Justice Scalia's views on the role of constitutional text in...
...Bush v. Gore A comment on Julia Vitullo-Martin's article on Justice Scalia: Lest we forget, the Gore campaign's strategy in Florida after election day 2000 was to conduct partial recount after partial recount, stopping after the first such partial recount produced a higher total for Gore...
...Another book I've enjoyed is Parker J. Palmer's Let Your Life Speak (Wiley, John & Sons...
...God bless Iraq...
...He is right: the church will not again be the People of God envisioned by Vatican II so long as its present structure prevails...
...In the epoch-opening decision of Griswold v. Connecticut (1965), where the court elevated privacy to constitutional status simply by announcing that it "presses for recognition here," Justice Black dissented, saying: "I like my privacy as well as the next one, but...I do not believe that we are granted power...to measure constitutionality by...our own notions of 'civilized standards of conduct.' Such an appraisal of the wisdom of legislation is an attribute of the power to make laws, not of the power to interpret them...
...the friendly struggle will probably be carried on by the disciples of each justice...
...We then estimated that it would take the cardinal several years to spend an hour with each...
...So much global good will and respect have been squandered in so few weeks...
...Leo O'Donovan's review of the MoMA's "Matisse Picasso" ("Novel Juxtapositions") is equally brilliant...
...It seems our hardware directs our tactics...
...Seminaries need to teach homiletics as more than a minor subject...
...The born-again Christians who bring Armageddon to those who irritate our sense of insecurity raise serious questions about their fundamentalism (prolife...
...The book is peppered with vignettes of real people in various occupations, their very real work-life challenges, and how they incorporate religion and spirituality in dealing with these challenges...
...Who are the people around the president...
...Megastructures of many kinds are toppling these days from sheer top-heavy weight...
...Some reputable Protestant ministers may be willing to teach such courses...
...I was startled when Dinter said he had tried, unsuccessfully, to have an hour's visit with his bishop (at the time Cardinal Terence Cooke...
...It is, rather, a self-pitying tale of a Mafia brat being groomed to take over his father's "business," a plan that hits a snag when the father gets bumped off...
...For example, Dade County first declined to recount, then started a re- , count in the areas that most heavily supported Gore, then stopped when it became obvious that a full recount would favor Bush...
...Instead, the dogs of war, hatred, anger, and revenge have been loosed, with consequences that one is reluctant to imagine for Americans wherever they might be...
...Under whatever theory of law, the United State Supreme Court could not allow such a cynical manipulation of election results...
...The tribute published in the Court's official reports (1971) at the time of Justice Black's death notes: "It is a happy vignette of judicial history and a tribute to both men that their friendship grew and flourished in the midst of their vigorous debate...
...Too many priests, aware of their own deficiencies in the art of preaching, have joined the local Toastmasters Club, which is the nearest thing they can find to a preaching wellness center...
...Perhaps in these, Baker will find some of what was missing in the books he's reviewed so far on this topic...
...When I asked him how many priests there (Continued on page 4) (Continued from page 2) were in the Archdiocese of New York, he said, ruefully, about thirteen hundred, counting both secular and religious...
...Friends of the United States have every expectation that the voice of (Continued on page 30) CORRESPOHDEHCE (Continued from page 4) sanity, honesty, and reason will prevail, and that the vaunted voice of a free press and academy will hold the administration to public account...
...You deserve better from your leadership, which should be taking all measures to save you from harm at home and abroad...
...To the Editors Original originalist Regarding Julia Vitullo-Martin's "Justice & Antonin Scalia" (March 28): I do not believe that Justice Scalia's views on the role of constitutional text in decision making are much, if any, different from those of the late Hugo Black, whose dissent in Adamson v. California (1946) is still the best demonstration of how the concept of original understanding works...
...J. D. COULSON Ottawa, Canada Badfellas I bought For the Sins of My Father after seeing it reviewed in Commonweal ("They're Not Goodfellas," Michael O. Garvey, February 28), assuming it would be a major contribution to understanding the Italian-American Mafia, like Gay Talese's seminal Honor Thy Father...
...RITA C. CREEL South Riding, Va...
...Listen up I suspect that many of the eyes gazing up from the pews at the Sunday preacher are glazed rather than enraptured, mostly for the reasons Willard Jabusch described so well in "Pappa Don't Preach" (March 28...
...Saintly as he was reputed to be, Cooke could not possibly have known his priests, and thus was, so far as Dinter was concerned, and, I presume, for all but a few of the other priests, an absentee shepherd...
...We can only pray for a prompt and peaceful, lasting resolution...
...JOSEPH D. POLICANO East Hampton, N.Y...
...What are they thinking...
...Listening to what is for many parishioners a weekly occasion of long-suffering, and more important, may be the only regular contact they have with the Gospels, can be a valuable teaching moment...
...God bless America...
...bill mendus Kansas City, Mo...
...Dinter is right Donald Cozzens's review (March 28) of Paul Dinter's The Other Side of the Altar reminded me of an evening I spent with Dinter in the early 1980s, when he was chaplain at Columbia University...
...They were kissing Saddam's cheeks twenty years ago when he supplied us with oil...
...Megadioceses are not immune to the phenomenon...
...Juxtapositions Thank you for the March 28 issue, which was a wonderful collection of articles-especially Richard Alleva's review of Chicago ("Razzle-Dazzle 'Em"), which is in the same league as James Harvey's books on romantic comedy...
...J. Bryan Hehir raises excellent questions in his analysis of the war in Iraq ("An Unnecessary War...
...Where did these people come from...
...Northern exposure As a fan of Commonweal and Americans, I have closely followed commentary on the Iraq war "project" of the Bush administration...
...The course must consist in more than a schedule of practice sermons by students who may be steeped in theology and filled with personal spirituality but are starved of public speaking technique...
...leroy t. matthiesen Amarillo, Tex...
...it does not speak well for the importance Vatican II places on the Liturgy of the Word...
...Other priests are not sufficiently aware of their oratorical deficiencies-few parishioners are outspoken enough to tell them-to look for remedial help...
...It would be nice if Scalia, a current disciple of Black's interpretational approach, could give the country a similar example of civility...
...Those of us who had hoped for patience and use of the United Nations by your administration are disappointed with the rush to war, and we grieve for what lies ahead for our friends to the south, particularly the good men and women in the military...
...Recommended reading In his review of three books on religion in the workplace ("Something Missing," March 14), Thomas Baker laments, "Perhaps that's what we're missing overall in these books: some real life or some real companies, some actual people and examples, some sense of how much fun and conflict, and how many difficult choices, work brings us...
...NADINE GALLO Hadley, Mass...
...rod o'connor Raleigh, N.G...
...Along with periodic retreats to refresh their spirituality, priests should be required to spend at least two Sundays a year seated in the pews at some distant parish...
...As an engineer with nearly twenty years in the profession, I've found the book's lessons helpful as I make choices that will affect not only my family, but also my colleagues and the users of the systems we are involved in creating...
...The postelection investigations by news organizations concluded that under any set of rules consistently applied, a comprehensive recount would favor Bush...
...most rev...
...Although our technology is beating Iraq's, the future looks bleaker...
...Let me report that this is not an easy time to be a Canadian visiting the United States, given the frequent "with us or against us" rhetoric...
...It is time our church began to break them down to sheepfold size...
...Are they capable of understanding the notion of consequences and the need for considered foresight...
...That the people in the pews accept the paraphrasing of familiar Gospel readings as the norm for most Sunday sermons is a reflection of their tolerance for the mediocre...
...Attorney Rudolph Giuliani is identified as District Attorney) and tasteless (the author is given, at the age of thirteen, his own whore by his father), I didn't think it worthy of a Commonweal review and certainly not the glowing one it received...
...Nevertheless, contrary to Florida law, the Florida Supreme Court was going to use the partial Dade County recount...
...The story of that friendship had its final chapter in adjacent rooms at Bethesda Naval Hospital...
...But in contrast to Scalia's "shockingly bad temper toward his intellectual opponents," Black maintained the warmest personal relations with his chief intellectual opponent, Justice John Harlan II...
...God bless us all...
...Might I suggest Spirituality @ Work (Loyola), by Gregory F. A. Pierce...
...This strategy was plain from the start...
...At the time of our visit, I was the bishop of Amarillo, a small mission diocese in Texas...
...GEORGE E. WARD Plymouth, Mich...
...Poorly written, carelessly edited (U.S...
Vol. 130 • April 2003 • No. 8
