To the Editors.

The sins of 'Commonweal'

I believe "Relative Morality" (November 3, 2000) is the last and best word on the Catholic church and gay people of all that I've read in recent months in Commonweal. Until I read the article, I had never considered how the church's animus toward gays is on an altogether different plane from its stance toward divorced Catholics, single parents, contraceptive users, and women who've had abortions. Only we are defective, constitutionally evil people.

Father Willard Jabusch illustrates how people, including priests and bishops, are forced to reevaluate their beliefs when they learn that they have lesbian or gay friends and relatives. They begin to see past the stereotypes to the love and devotion in same-sex couples, the integrity and courage marking the lives of "out-of-the-closet" people.

So I say that "Relative Morality" has covered a multitude of sins. I don't know how members of Commonweal's editorial board do not hear the voice of Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson when they use the term "Homosexual Agenda" (October 6). You don't have to be gay to recognize the barb, the sting. It harks back to a term like the "Communist agenda."

I disagree with some of the other points made in the editorial and the "Department of Amplification" (December 1), though I take your side on the use of the word "bigotry." There are many Catholics who are not evil haters, bigots. They are just people who have not reconsidered what they are taught by churchmen.

That's why it's so satisfying to read in Commonweal an essay by a Catholic priest looking at the issue from the human, not the academic, point of view.

JOHN T. MORAN
Jackson Heights, N.Y.

Specimen or person?

The September 22, 2000 issue of Commonweal printed a letter from Mafalda Faillace on the subject of pregnancy and abortion. She made the point that in Catholic (and other) hospitals, if a woman miscarries and the fetus is less than twenty weeks or 500 grams, it is considered a pathological specimen, and it is not baptized. She also noted that a family insurance policy from the Knights of Columbus would not cover the fetus in such a circumstance.

Assuming the writer's statements are accurate, I expected that the letter would stimulate some controversy or discussion, given the Catholic church's position that human life begins at the moment of conception. So far, however, it has not. This puzzles me. If it is considered human at conception, why isn't it treated as human nineteen weeks later if it miscarries? Also, if a 450-gram fetus that miscarries at nineteen weeks is a pathological specimen, what should we call a less-than-twenty-week aborted fetus of the same weight?

I would welcome hearing from those wiser than I am in this field, their views on what appears to me to be a dilemma.

WILLIAM D. BRODERICK
Arlington, Va.

Higgins to Neuhaus

Largely ignoring the substance of my article, "Are Unions Obsolete?" (November 3, 2000), my friend Father Richard John Neuhaus in his rejoinder (December 1) said that it was "false and offensive" on my part to say that he had never publicly spoken this way about Cardinal John O'Connor's stand on labor issues while the cardinal was alive.

Neuhaus would have every right to be offended if that was what I had actually said. But it is emphatically not what I said. I knew perfectly well that Father Neuhaus had more than once said his piece in public about labor issues while the cardinal was alive. I also assumed, of course, that the cardinal, who had the reputation of being a serious reader, was fully aware of what Father Neuhaus had written about labor issues. But that's not what I was talking about in my article. Referring to his National Catholic Register interview in which he said that the cardinal's support of labor unions was "a weakness rather than a strength," I said that he "never spoke that way about the cardinal's stand on labor issues while the cardinal was alive."

There is nothing in Neuhaus's letter to dispute or even question the accuracy of this statement. I might add that I refrained from saying in my article that Neuhaus's silence in public about the cardinal's stand on labor issues until the cardinal had passed away was rather strange in view of the fact that, to his credit, Neuhaus has frequently and delightedly crossed swords in public with other living and high-ranking ecclesiastics. Rembert Weakland is a prime example in this regard. I have no way of knowing why Neuhaus made an exception in the case of Cardinal O'Connor.

At the end of his letter Neuhaus expresses the hope that I will emulate Cardinal O'Connor's admirable policy of accommodating respectful disagreement. Not to worry. As one who has been around the polemic track for more than fifty years, I don't take disagreements personally even when I feel that I have been misquoted, inadvertently or otherwise. In short, even though I honestly think that Neuhaus misconstrued my article, I still consider him a friend, and, needless to add, I hope that this feeling is mutual.

(MSGR.) GEORGE G. HIGGINS
Washington, D.C.

Ahead of the 'Times'

I was reminded recently of my appreciation of Commonweal's coverage of religion in the public square as I read Alan Wolfe's balanced critique of God's Name in Vain by Stephen Carter (November 3, 2000). The acceptance of a call for a religious voice in public discourse and a faith-based fortification of religious liberty and civic morality was a pleasant change from the strident rejection we so often hear--usually encoded in the so-called doctrine of separation of church and state--in the liberal media. Wolfe, while appreciating Carter's prognosis about the lack of space for the religious voice in much of contemporary American society, suggests that Carter exaggerates the extent of ordinary American hostility to making room for faith in the public arena. Wolfe, however, does not let his skepticism on this point cloud his responsibility to provide an honest review of Carter's thesis. The honesty was a vivid contrast to the hostile review of Carter's book by Brent Staples in the New York Times Book Review (November 26, 2000).

As a professor at an elite, secular, midwestern liberal college for twenty years, I have witnessed the subtle and not-so-subtle hostility toward religious expression. The arguments: it is putatively not relevant in "intellectual" arenas, reflects emotional rather than reasoned argument, and lacks moral (!) merit because it is presumably unthinkingly exclusive, historically and culturally oppressive, and remains closed to contemporary ideas about values, lifestyles, and priorities. I have seen students ridiculed for defending positions based on faith/belief arguments and orientations. College campuses are famous for their tolerance, but it is often a selective tolerance--a tolerance that often fences out conservative Christian expression. Hinduism or atheism is OK but Christianity, because of its so-called exclusive foundation, is not safe from the fence-it-out mentality of the liberal academic establishment that views "exclusive religion" as unacceptable in discussion of the life of the mind.

The irony of the double standard on tolerance and the liberal interpretation of what is acceptable is also seen in Staples's throwaway line near the end of his review. He writes, "The problem is that fundamentalism is incompatible with the capacious ecumenicalism that rules the public square." Indeed the combative assertion that conservative religion is unacceptable is the problem, and it is the very point that Carter makes in his follow-up book to The Culture of Disbelief.

Readers of Commonweal are considerably better served by its standards of balance than the readers of the New York Times Book Review are served by its more polemical standards.

LOUISA SUE HULET
Galesburg, Ill.

Guy talk

Regarding your commentary "The Homosexual Agenda" (October 6): So it isn't "clear" that women or homosexuals have suffered as severely as a "class" as have African Americans. Only an arrogant straight white male could have written such a line.

I suggest that you get off your smug Catholic butt and start doing some research. For starters, try reading Byrne Fone's Homophobia. Women have been suffering under the yoke of sexism since the beginning of time (much longer than African Americans). Homophobia is the byproduct of sexism. Have you ever read the Old Testament?

Shame on Commonweal for publishing such a reactionary piece.

CARLOS D. CHAVEZ JR.
Los Angeles, Calif.

Gay Catholics

Over the last several months I have followed the editorials and letters on the homosexual agenda (October 6, 2000 and issues following). While I am in agreement with Commonweal's position that there is a homosexual agenda and that such an agenda should be open to dialogue in the political arena, I am surprised that few seem to have included any serious, sustained observation on the implications for gays in the Catholic church's own agenda. While there are differences among individual bishops (nationally) and conferences (internationally) on various rights, the official position of the church remains opposed to the majority of societal changes that are integral elements of the homosexual agenda. What puzzles me is the goal of the church with regard to an orientation that it describes as objectively disordered.

While the causes of this orientation are unknown at present (most probably, a combination of biological, psychological, social, and other factors), it is a virtual certainty that, given the rapid advances in these fields, we will know with a high level of confidence its causes within the next several decades. Is the goal (agenda) of the church, while showing compassion to gays, to support research to eliminate this objective disorder through means acceptable to the church, for example, genetic surgery in utero with no adverse side effects? Such a thought sends tremors of fear and distrust into the minds and hearts of the gay community, who are already fighting an uphill battle for their legitimate place at the Lord's table. Until such time as the church can move toward a more neutral stance on the interpretation of the orientation itself--at root, a difficult, but serious theological and philosophical question--most dialogue between the gay community and the church will remain one of defensive posturing.

ROBERT J. COMISKEY
Springfield, Va.

The editors comment: We doubt that the official church is supporting research to eliminate gays through genetic surgery, or otherwise.

Voting rights 

Your stand against the bombastic activities of the Bush campaign was courageous, ("Votes Count," December 15, 2000). But I also agree with those who said Gore should have asked for the statewide recount first thing, so it wouldn't look like he hand-picked the counties where he expected the most support. I will keep a copy of your editorial with my Boston Globe from the day after the election as a reminder of the preciousness of my vote and everyone else's. The editorial echoes the sentiments of many Americans, even beyond partisanship, yet speaks volumes about our resilient, but battered democratic system of government and the primacy of the vote.

DIANE LAVOS
Natick, Mass.