2003 LETTERS
November
October
September
July/August
June
May
April
March
February
January

Little Notes

Confessions
Talk About Movies
Roamin' Catholic
Follow Me




Contents © 2003
by Jim Holman.
All rights reserved.

LETTERS
June 2003

---

How very unwelcoming of you to greet the new USD president with an article based on an unnamed, disbelieving faculty member [see "USD's New President", May Little Notes]. Had you or the faculty member checked beyond the Cardinal Newman website for the story facts, you would have found a very different story than the innuendo you gave: "...a sudden change at St. Benedict's."

I won't give you the full story -- that is the job of a true journalist. But that kind of history is what is left out of innuendo and provides people like you to jump to conclusions and lead your readers along.

Dr. Lyons is far from "an old hippy liberal". But perhaps before condemning her you might try to meet her; before sowing seeds of discontent among her faculty and the Catholic community, you might try to get the facts straight. But ... probably that would require not only journalistic integrity but a Christian approach as well.

Lois Markovich
Via email


VARGAS VOTES ARE ONLY PART OF STORY

As a practicing Catholic I enjoy reading your publication. However, I do not always agree with the content of your "articles." Moreover, I say this because most oftentimes they are not "articles" by any definition of the English language. They are instead commentaries and/or editorials.

Case in point, the commentary by Maria Elena Kennedy asks whether the bishop will "Stand Up to Vargas." Unfortunately, Ms. Kennedy takes a (pardon the pun) "holier than thou" attitude towards Assemblyman Vargas.

Ms. Kennedy appears to live in a fantasy world. A world where terms like "negotiations," "compromise," and "real-life choices" do not exist. I know Mr. Vargas personally. And I know that he is a family man of a solid moral conviction. He has a hands-on approach that has resulted in real change for communities that were severely under-represented before his arrival.

It should not be forgotten that people in an elected office have to make difficult choices. Just as soldiers in the battlefield have to kill to defend the freedom of nations; so too do elected officials have to make decisions that may very well be contrary to their personal religious convictions. More importantly, this in and of itself is not a sin.

Ms. Kennedy should take the time to learn more about our religion before she starts casting stones at others. The Roman Catholic doctrine is very complex and not as "black and white" as she would have us believe. In fact, there are movements within the church whose whole purpose is to live in the margin of society in order to be prayerful and in order to question both the church and society.

For example, the Benedictine communities of men and women were never intended to be part of the hierarchical or clerical status of the church, but rather to stand apart from this structure and offer a different voice. This arrangement allows for a more objective sort of "checks and balances" within the church.

And this system works. In 2001, Benedictine Sister Christine Vladimiroff refused to follow a Vatican Order. She was ordered to forbid Benedictine Sister Joan Chittister from attending and speaking at the Women's Ordination Worldwide Conference (Summer 2001). The order was issued because of the 1995 Vatican ban on further discussion on the issue of women's ordination.

Vladimiroff made the decision to disobey the Vatican order.

However, the Benedictine tradition sees obedience as relational and collaborative. Prior to making her decision, Vladimiroff met with high-ranking church officials and canon lawyers. She further insists that her decision does not make her a lesser or divisive part of the church.

In the same vein, Vargas' voting record when seen alone as a component of his many, many responsibilities is not truly indicative of his character as a Catholic, as a father, as a son or even as a human being.

In conclusion, the next time Ms. Kennedy prepares to write another commentary, she should reflect on the words of Belgian Jesuit missionary, Michael Windley: "Religions have to become the vehicles of peace and human dignity and stop being battlefields of spiritual dominance or arrogance."

Ricardo Gomez-Roji
San Diego

Editor: Catholic theologians and the Pope are extremely clear about abortion. Vargas has made a real-life decision, and he's made it in favor of death.


THE IMPORTANCE OF SAN DIEGO

First Father Rudy Kos of the Dallas diocese visited San Diego. Then Father Shanley, the NAMBLA priest, came to visit our diocese. Both were arrested here. Now, Father Rossetti, priest and psychologist has been brought to San Diego for a policy speech by the bishop [see "Hear No Evil", May 2003]. Father Kos was one of the most notorious pedophile-pederasts in the nation's history. He is now in prison, as will be Father Shanley, the NAMBLA pederast from the notorious Boston diocese.

What is the connection with Father Rossetti? Fr. Rossetti was brought here for a reason: to justify the diocese's and Bishop Brom's public violation of the Vatican's repeated prohibitions (1961 Ordination Guidelines, 1997 Congregation letter to bishops, et al) against ordination of homosexuals. Fr. Rossetti serves two masters: he is simultaneously a Roman Catholic priest and a psychologist. The Church teaches that homosexuality is a disorder; in the early seventies, the American Psychological Association "decriminalized" homosexuality in its diagnostic manual.

Fr. Rossetti is very influential. He has written papers justifying homosexual ordinations that appear on the U.S Bishops website, along with Fathers Blanchette and Coleman from the notorious Saint Patrick's seminary in Menlo Park. (In the past three years, two staff members from Saint Patrick's were reportedly arrested for homosexual lewd conduct in the Bay Area). Rossetti has reportedly recently appeared in the Vatican with non-Catholic psychologists to block a Vatican public reiteration of its prohibition of homosexual ordinations. He was probably acting for the U.S. Bishops' Conference.

In addition, Rossetti is head of St. Luke's Institute, a veritable recycling center for pederasts. Saint Luke's founder was a priest and practicing homosexual who died of AIDS. It is at the center of the homosexual abuse scandal in the Church. Many priest-abusers have been clients there. Among the pederast clients of St Luke's were Father Kos of Dallas, Fr. Gauthe of Louisiana, Fr. Geoghan of Boston, and Father "Hollywood" Harris of Los Angeles. At least one abuser-priest committed suicide at St. Luke's.

Father Rossetti's papers are a mixture of sophistry, psychobabble, and denial. He refuses to admit that homosexuals are "disordered." He cannot answer the question: if disordered men are ordained, will we not then have disordered priests? He claims that heterosexuals molest young boys and men. Nonsense. If a man molests a boy, he is a homosexual, by definition. He claims that heterosexuals abuse more than homosexuals. True, but clever sophistry nonetheless. There are far more heterosexuals in the population. He knows that homosexuals comprise only about 3 percent of the population, yet commit aver 30 percent of molestations. This is at least a ten-to-one ratio. Look at the Church abuse scandal: at least 90 percent of the victims are young boys and men who are victims of homosexual pederast-pedophiles. Six bishops have been removed for homosexual misconduct; at least two seminaries have been closed for the same reason.

Yet Rossetti claims that celibacy will magically shield the young men from ravenous pederasts. Celibacy is a mighty thin protective shield. If only "mature" homosexual men were ordained, the problem would be solved, according to Fr. Rossetti. Yet were not Frs. Kos and Shanley, the most monstrous pederasts, described as mature and "charismatic." So were Fr. "Hollywood" Harris and Ex-Bishop Ziemann of Los Angeles. Both were mature and close associates of Cardinal Mahony. They are among the most prolific abusers.

Is it any wonder that we have so many disordered priests and bishops chasing and abusing young men?

Ralph Ballmer
Escondido


ANSWER TO FR. O'CALLAGHAN

Stan Espedal is to be commended for a fine and interesting article [see "No Punches Pulled," May 2003] on Eastern Orthodox priest Father Paul O'Callaghan. It is tragic that the sins and scandals surrounding the debased celebrations of the Ordo Missæ or Paul VI in all too many Catholic parishes should have led him and others to abandon the "one and only Church" established by Christ on the Rock of Peter. Fortunately, the Church is making efforts to restore the splendor and solemnity of the Latin-rite liturgy, which has been the object of tampering by aptly labeled "liturgical terrorists" who were allowed to run loose in our dioceses.

Catholics cannot accept his conclusion that "Wherever Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism differed, Orthodoxy had preserved the original tradition of the undivided Church, and Roman Catholicism had strayed from it." To the contrary, it is the autocephalous Eastern Orthodox churches who have deviated from the ancient Church's belief in the Primacy of Peter perduring in the See of Rome, the Procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and (or through) the Son, and on such major moral issues as divorce and remarriage and contraception.

Fr. O'Callaghan writes that the "real difference [between Catholics and Eastern Orthodox] is what they teach about grace. Orthodoxy teaches that grace is the uncreated grace of God poured forth on man. Roman Catholicism teaches that grace is created -- God causes certain effects in the mind and soul of man." There is no official dogmatic definition binding on all Orthodox churches which would deny that there is created grace. Actually, the Catholic Church teaches that created grace and Uncreated Grace are inseparable and correlative. It is the Holy Spirit Himself who is Uncreated Grace and who swells in us as the source of that created grace (sanctifying grace) which divinizes the soul.

Whatever union Eastern Orthodox bishops still possess, it does not add up to the indivisible unity which the Catholic Church enjoys under the visible headship of the successor of Peter, head and leader of the Apostles.

As for dissenting theologians being unknown among the Eastern Orthodox, one has only to read the many statements of various bishops and theologians deploring the lack of unity among the Eastern Orthodox churches. For example, the Eastern Orthodox Metropolitan Moses of Seattle recently declared other hierarchical jurisdictions "heretical," deplored the "heresy of the patriarchate of Constantinople," and lamented that "World Orthodoxy has been dragged into heresy by false shepherds. There is no land remaining where genuine Orthodoxy comprises the state Church."

May Catholics pray for the return of Fr. O'Callaghan to the true Church.

James Likoudis
www.credobuffalo.com
(author of The Divine Primacy of the Bishop of Rome and Modern Eastern Orthodoxy: Letters of a Greek Orthodox on the Unity of the Church.)


COIN-OPERATED GOVERNOR

Re Jeanette Arthur's letter in your May issue: Try reading our local paper ('Oh, my, the Copley Press as the regional answer to the Barstow Gazette?') and watch the news ('Hmmm, the Talking Heads (Ken and Barbie) of the Broadcast News and Stepford Media?'). As a non-Catholic who despises our Veterans Killer and Coin Operated Governor as much as any reader, I think it is Ms Jeanette Arthur who needs to get plugged in. An ostrich by any other name....

Donald Raymond Lake
Citizens For A Better Veterans Home


FROM HUMBLE SAINTS

In response to Irv Woodruff from Leucadia and his letter about the response of local pastors to gay pride day and the zoo: "what did our Catholic leadership do about this issue?"

Both associate pastors at the parishes downtown closest to the Park spoke out at Sunday Mass against the event and condemned homosexuality as a sin, along with "pride." Bishop Brom evidently received letters of protest or offense. The priests were then informed of the sensitivities of the congregation.

Dear Irv, maybe leadership now has to come from below -- from humble saints as in centuries past. Let's pray we're one of them.

Name withheld
Downtown San Diego


GOD IS CENTER OF HER LIFE

I read the first paper you sent me with great interest even though I did not agree with all of your conclusions. The second paper I received had an article about Sister Marilyn Ann Morgan, RSM [see "Lessons From the Liturgical Left", March 2003]. The article was very derogatory against Sister, who happens to be a member of my religious community. I totally disagreed with your findings. I know Sister personally, and God is very much the center of her life. All she does is to bring the gospel message to those who would receive it. You may not agree with her opinions; that is your right.

Because of that article, I do not wish to receive your paper. Save a tree.

Sister Rosanne McGrath, RSM
Vista


HE COULD NOT SUCCEED

I have three comments for Disgusted, author of "Your Diatribe" in the April letters to the editor:

1. He should ask for a refund from wherever it was he received his "journalism" training.

2. He did not attempt to "correct and refute" Mr. Kumpel, not because he would be talking to himself, but because he knew if he tried he could not succeed.

3. I would not identify myself either, for what he or she wrote displays a complete lack of knowledge of the Roman Catholic Church.

B.B.
Kensington

TOP