Inside
NCR
One of the traditional strengths of
NCR has been its Letters pages. We want to keep it that way, so
were a little concerned that e-mail responses that go directly to writers
and columnists have been cutting into the letters to the editor. Some of our
writers have made us aware of an especially strong response to a story or
column and, on checking, weve found out that many of you were agreeable
to having your e-mail printed.
Some of you had intended that, and didnt realize there was a
separate e-mail address or that the letters might stop at the writers
e-mail box. So, help us out here. We suggest you either designate on the
original e-mail that you want us to consider it for print, or send a copy along
to letters@natcath.org.
Readers often remark favorably on not only the volume of letters
we print but also the scope of the discussion and the number of letters we
print that disagree with a point of view or a story. Help us keep those pages
as alive and diverse as possible.
Speaking of e-mail, an e-mail
address that appeared in Arthur Jones perspective piece on the editorial
page of the Jan. 26 issue was incorrect. To get in touch with the group
organized to overturn the 1996 Immigration Act, use:
borderwitness2@juno.com.
If the initial reaction to the
Hows your parish? cover story in the Jan. 26 issue is any
indication, Catholics are concerned about finding that home, the
parish where they feel welcome. Your responses make clear, first, that
territorial boundaries no longer necessarily define where you go to church.
Second, the search is for parishes that will not only nourish but will also
challenge the community to think, to see the world differently from the popular
culture and provide avenues for acting to make the world better. We really do
want to live out the redemptive message.
As a result of that story, someone
told me of a retired monsignor celebrating Mass in eastern Kansas some months
ago at a church hardly known as a progressive hotbed. At homily time, he began
talking about church history and the fact that not all the rules we have in
place now have been in place since the beginning. At one point, he suggested
that maybe it is time for the church to rethink its rules about celibacy and
ordaining women.
As the story was told to me, the congregation gave him a standing
ovation. All of which says to me that there is a common sense that runs rather
deep out there. Thoughtful, reasonable people and their leaders see survival of
a eucharistic community far more important than preservation of rules that grew
out of a tangle of motives embedded in a complex history.
-- Tom Roberts
My email address is troberts@natcath.org
National Catholic Reporter, February 9,
2001
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