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Contents © 1999
by Jim Holman.
All rights reserved.

June 1998

The majority of America's Catholic bishops were allowed nothing to say about this document. Still less were they permitted any suggestions of comments about the "advisers" and consultants used by the committee, who, by their own boasting and the ordinary "rumor mill," have been detected to be people whose qualifications in this area of moral conduct are highly questionable. The document, in a view which is shared by many, is founded on bad advice, mistaken theology, erroneous science, and skewed sociology. It is pastorally helpful in no perceptible way....

The character of this document is such that it would require a book of many pages to point out all its bad features, which sometimes cross the border from poor advice to evil advice....

"Calamity and frightening disaster" are terms which are not too excessive to describe this document. It is my view that this document carries no weight or authority for Catholics, whom I would advise to ignore or oppose it.

-- "Flawed and Defective," by Bishop Fabian W. Bruskewitz, Social Justice Review, April 1998


AFTER CONSIDERABLE GUILT AND PRAYER, John and I decided to pony up the five thousand dollars and have his vasectomy reversed. Because of this decision, which seemed logical enough to us, we discovered what a tenacious hold contraception has on the minds of Americans. The urologist thought John was insane and couldn't accept our desire to obey Church teaching, even if he would accept our money. Our families -- ardent pro-choicers, all of them -- were even less tolerant when they found out....

What was most surprising was what happened when John was cornered into explaining his anticipated sick leave from work. Word spread around his office like the watery contents of a smashed bottle, and co-workers who routinely excoriated pro-life protectors for failing to respect "choice" came to his office and tried to talk him out of what he had chosen to do. So did one or two Catholics in the group.

-- "The Celibate Bachelor Was Right!" by Rachel Fay, This Rock, April 1998


THE LAY TRUSTEES OF GONZAGA UNIVERSITY in Spokane, Wash., against the wishes of the Jesuit leadership, on April 17th elected as Gonzaga's new president Fr. Robert J. Spitzer, S.J., 45, a professor of philosophy and business ethics at Seattle University....

He is considered one of the brightest and most articulate of the new wave of orthodox Jesuits, and his selection by the board to be president of Gonzaga is considered by some key Jesuits as the most significant appointment in more than 25 years.

"For 25 years, a Jesuit of Spitzer's stripe hasn't been appointed to anything," one Jesuit, who requested anonymity, told The Wanderer. "This is a major chink in the armor of the Jesuit establishment, but it's good news for Gonzaga: It means it will attract more students, more money, and, for the Jesuits, more vocations which they desperately need."

-- "News Notes," weekly column in the Wanderer, April 30, 1998


FOR MANY WANDERER READERS, some of the most entertaining reading in recent issues has been those provocative, feisty, searing, and satirical ads on the back page for the New Oxford Review (NOR), a 20-year-old Catholic monthly published in the belly of the left coast beast, Berkeley.

But those ads -- which poke fun at "Fr. Bozo's" liturgies, ask provocative questions such as, "Does Jesus Have Two Mommies?," lampoon liturgists for trying to impose their version of "touchy-feely Catholicism" on churchgoers, or mock "wishywashy bishops" -- are also a sign of our discontented times.

The advertisements, which have been banned by the editors of America, The National Catholic Register, and Our Sunday Visitor from their publications, says NOR's editor Dale Vree, are "a sign that the Church is becoming more and more polarized as we approach the end of this pontificate....

"Catholic journalism is tremendously polarized. That's a fact. It's there. We can't pretend there isn't a civil war going on in the Church, and all Catholics have to decide which side they're on."

-- "Those Feisty, 'Banned' New Oxford Review Ads," by Paul Likoudis, the Wanderer, May 7, 1998


THE VATICAN BEGAN EXPRESSING CONCERNS in 1992 when the UNICEF board developed a statement on family planning to guide its participation in the 1994 population conference in Cairo, Egypt....

Archbishop Martino, the Vatican nuncio to the U.N., with the approval of Cardinal Sodano, papal Secretary of State, suspended contributions to UNICEF.

Archbishop Martino noted that UNICEF failed to account to donors who had noted objectionable programs; UNICEF contributed to U.N. publications advocating abortifacients; UNICEF lobbied governments in a bid to legalize abortion, as their workers also advocate and distribute contraceptives (Catholic NY 16:16 [1/23/97] p. 6)....

Of course, Hillary Clinton, Carol Bellamy and the notorious "Catholics for Free Choice" (NY Times [11/10/96] p. 11) decry and/or deny all of this.

Thus, informed Catholic readers have a choice: one can learn from Cardinal Sodano and Archbishop Martino, or, one can join the screamer's lobby that will not rest until they make abortion the fundamental and even universal woman's "right."

-- from "Questions Answered," by Monsignor William B. Smith, Homiletic & Pastoral Review, May 1998


ACCORDING TO THE U.S. CENSUS, some 60% of married couples at 45 years of age in the United States have been neutered.... Well over 80% of American Catholics couples, safe to say, are either sterilized, are contracepting or are using abortifacients.

-- "The Bitter Pill," letter to the

editor by Reverend Paul Marx, Catholic Dossier, May-June 1998


FRANCISCAN SR. KATARINA SCHUTH of Rochester, Min., who serves on the Catholic Common Ground Committee and who has visited every U.S. seminary over the past 14 years, noted that seminarians are coming from the center and the right, but "almost none" from the progressive side.

-- "Federation faces up to priestly problems," National Catholic Reporter, May 15, 1998


ONE CALIFORNIA MOTHER WROTE THE SOUTHERN CROSS (San Diego diocesan newspaper) to warn parents that 7th and 8th grade students at St. James School, Solana Beach, were allowed to "read for pleasure" the controversial autobiography [of Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings]. The book includes "anti-white" messages and the author's thoughts on lesbianism. The California mom quoted from "one of many equally foul sections."

Background: A little girl is in bed with her stepfather.

"Mr. Freeman pulled me to him and put his hand between my legs. He didn't hurt, but Momma had drilled into my head: 'Keep your legs closed, and don't let nobody see your pocketbook.'

'Now, I didn't hurt you.' He threw back the blankets and his 'thing' stood up like an ear of brown corn. He took my hand and said, 'Feel it.' It was mushy and squirmy like the inside of a freshly killed chicken. Then he dragged me on top of his chest..."

Of course, the mother's letter was not printed. Perhaps the Catholic paper felt the text was too graphic for their adult readership but OK in a Catholic classroom.

-- "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings," Mother's Watch newsletter, Spring 1998

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