FROM
THE POST OFFICE
Brooklyn Pastor Objects to Listing on Gay Website
I have learned that your name was listed as having forwarded an article from LifeSite Daily News, dated March 30, 2004. In this article, the parish of St. Andrew the Apostle in Brooklyn, NY, has been listed on a website of what has been called “gay-friendly” Catholic parishes.
Please know that the parish staff of St. Andrew’s promotes a welcoming Catholic atmosphere that fully adheres to the teachings and discipline of the Roman Catholic Church, including in the area of sexual morality. We seek to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ in its fullness, nourishing the souls of the faithful with sound spiritual food. We do not promote “sodomy and other perverted sex acts” in any manner. The suggestion that we are knowingly offering Holy Communion in a sacrilegious manner is false.
I am contacting LifeSiteNews.com as well as Catholiclesbians.org in order to inform them of this. If you wish to discuss this further, please feel free to contact me.
Msgr. Guy Massie,
Pastor
Brooklyn, NY
CNS Cheers “Notorious Dissenter” Charlie Curran
The Arlington Catholic Herald did not print this letter. We agree with its content and join the author to ask why The Herald doesn’t use more reliable news sources? We personally recommend Catholic World News. Editor
Once again, Catholic News Service, an arm of the bishops' conference, disappoints. In your CNS article, "Six New Books on Pope John Paul II" (ACH 4/14/05), first on the list and receiving favorable mention as "complete," "useful" and an "approachable summary," is a book by notorious dissenter Charles Curran. While the review mentions he was barred from teaching as a Catholic theologian, why publicize him in a supportive way in a Catholic newspaper?
Coincidentally enough, Curran came in for mention two days later in a Washington Post story on dissidents. The author pointed out that Curran is at odds with the Church on contraception, sterilization, homosexuality and divorce.
We also learn in that story that, from his professorial position at Southern Methodist University, Curran teaches "there are different levels of truth."
Surely, there are other sources for material for the Arlington Catholic Herald, i.e. ZENIT, RNS, even L'Osservatore Romano.
Charles Molineaux
McLean, VA
Brides Offend Modesty in Herald’s Wedding Issue
The Arlington Catholic Herald solicits photos of brides and grooms married during the past year for the “wedding issue.” All photos this year (and nearly all last year) showed brides in strapless gowns with chest, back, and arms bare. These appear not to be wedding gowns, but ball gowns, more suitable to a debutante’s “coming out” party.
Yet these pictures show brides in bridal veils. A veil is a symbol of modesty. The combination of the veil and the bare top of the bride is a ludicrous depiction. In wedding tradition the shorter of the two-part veil covers the bride’s face. Her father, or whoever “gives her away,” lifts the short veil when they reach the sanctuary revealing her face to the groom. With much of the top of the body already revealed, what is the point of veiling the face?
As warm weather approaches, many pastors admonish their flocks about not wearing sundresses, shorts, tanktops, and other immodest garments to Mass. They give scandal, and can be an occasion of sin. In the past, such warnings were unnecessary; Catholics knew better and Catholic girls were noted for their modesty. Now it appears both bishop and pastors blink when it comes to weddings. While fashionable according to the “world,” these gowns are immodest and offensive for Mass and reception of the Sacraments. Bishops and pastors could DO something about this outrage. Let us pray to the very model of purity and chastity, the Blessed Virgin Mary, that Catholics will exercise better judgment in what they wear and The Herald in what it prints.
Elizabeth
Poel,
Front Royal, VA