From Margaret M. Wysocka re Trudeau review.

Over the past five years I have read most of the issues of Catholic Insight. The articles selected for publication have always been written in a non-judgmental format irrespective of the author's viewpoint. The information on the various topics was factual and verifiable, with sources identified; and consequently they have been found to be reliable.

The September issue of your magazine deviates from this high quality journalism, very noticeably on pages 14 and 15 especially, as also do many of the letters published.

The last paragraph on page 14 of Paul Tuns' article is inaccurate. It was Mr. Grewal, ME who first asked for patronage appointments for himself and his wife. The Liberal MP to whom he made the request is reported to have given an indirect response, saying that there would be "rewards in the future," and that it would not be advisable to get into specifics at an early stage of the talks. (Verifiable on CBC and in Globe and Mail).

Page 15 (the continuation of the review of The Hidden Pierre Elliott Trudeau) is as disappointing as the book under review is, but for a different reason. The review itself cannot be taken seriously because most of it is based on innuendo and speculation. The only facts that are discernible and verifiable are the fact that Trudeau fathered an illegitimate daughter by a Newfoundland woman lawyer, Ms. Deborah Coyne.

As for the remarks about Mr. Trudeau's funeral it surely is a matter of opinion that only Mr. Trudeau and his confessor are qualified to comment on; and the one of the two cannot speak for himself because it was his own funeral that is being discussed!

Let us hope that future issues of Insight may be more charitable in similar cases. After all, Mr. Trudeau, like all of us, was answerable for his own sins. It is not our right to discuss such serious matters, either morally or legally. We have a right to judge the wrong judgments made because of their destructive consequences for society; but I cannot agree that we have the right to judge a sinner. Unfortunately, that is not the case here. Mr. Trudeau, the sinner, is accused of his sins. Only God knows how culpable each of us is. We do not know anyone else's state of soul.

I regret having to write this letter, but I feel that someone has to point out how merciless a judgment has been passed in this review, in the hope that there will never be another article so judgmental in Catholic Insight. It is cruel and insensitive. There is no legitimate reason to justify it; because it is destructive and, as I have said, based on innuendo and speculation (by discarded lovers moreover)!

Halifax, NS

The reviewer replies:

One supposes that it is possible to believe that Trudeau's sexual adventures are nothing but "innuendo and speculation" but in doing so, one will have to dismiss the personal accounts which have appeared in the press so far, together with the photos the newspapers have unearthed from their archives.

Liona Boyd's trysts may be found in her autobiography In My own key: My lift in love and music (1998). Others are scattered in various articles suck as Peter Newman) recent recollection of Trudeau (National Post, May 4, 2005). The story of Margot Kidder and two other lovers appeals in Pierre: Colleagues and friends talk about Trudeau, edited by Nancy Soutkam (Mc Clelland & Stewart, 2005, 388pages), a book reviewed in the national media. The figure of a possible 40 lovers is Margot Kidder), not mine, and should indeed be classified as speculation; but whether it should be dismissed out of hand is another question. The National Post published a full-page article on Kim Cattrall on May 14, 2005.

Trudeau's womanizing--just like that of American President John Kennedy, whom he resembles also in his cynicism about the role of the Church--is only becoming more fully known after his death.

As for Trudeau's views on abortion (legalization in 1969; refusal to place a clause protecting life in the 1981 Charter), they are fully documented, including his remark, 25 years after the event, of being proud of having passed the legislation. Under this law, over three million preborn human lives have been surgically and physically snuffed out to date, yet he was given an elaborate funeral in Montreal) most splendid church, presided over by a cardinal and an archbishop, without ever having publicly indicated, or acknowledged, or so muck as hinted at, that he cared one bit about mortal sin, or about Catholic moral teaching, or about any of the babies killed or their mothers.

Today, the same situation is being repeated in Ottawa where the archbishop wants us to believe that Mr. Martin is a "faithful member of my Cathedral parish," while Mr. Martin repeats, ad nauseam, that he believes in the Canadian Charter, not in natural law morality, not in Catholic teaching, not in what the Church says. He did it again on September 30, 2005. "I believe in the Charter!!!" When will Catholics wake up?