Facts About Fake Nuns

Dear Editor: I just received my latest issue of The Tablet. After reading News Briefs, I would like to comment.

The brief about the San Francisco Archbishop’s apology about giving communion to “Fake Nuns” is very misleading...one would think the incident was quite benign.

Since when is a Catholic newspaper so politically correct?

Have you seen photos of what these homosexuals looked like? They were dressed in drag as the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence... their sole purpose for being there was to make a mockery of the Church, the Mass and the Holy Eucharist.

It seems the archbishop was caught between a rock and a hard place. He found it easier to apologize to his congregation than to address what was really happening.

The newspapers in San Francisco didn’t cover this story, until they were forced to.

I had to find out the truth on the Bill O’Reilly show. At least, he had the courage to tell all the facts.

I’m very disappointed in the way this story was handled.

Audrey Menegus
Brooklyn

The Real Pro-Life President

Dear Editor: When I read the comments of a recent letter praising Democrats and exalting Bill Clinton as having a better pro-life record than George Bush, I had to pray for forbearance and reach for my antacids. This view does not square with reality. Clinton’s first five acts as president were an in-your-face expansion of abortion by, among other things, reversing a rule limiting abortion counseling at federally-funded clinics, lifting a ban on abortions at military facilities, and, rescinding Ronald Reagan’s “Mexico City” policy which previously prohibited foreign aid to be contingent to legal abortion in other countries. Among Bush’s first acts was to sign an order that restored and extended the Mexico City policy by withholding funding from any overseas agencies in any nation that in any way promoted abortion. The Bush administration has also pressured the United Nations to reverse many of its pro-abortion policies.

Abortion rates have been declining over the past 20 years, in spite of America’s liberal regime. Clinton held as his one and only irrevocable criteria for appointing a judge was that they share liberal fantasies about abortion being the most sacrosanct prerogative in the human experience. It was one of Clinton’s appeals court judges who trashed, yet again, the Constitution and representative democracy by overturning the law against partial-birth abortion. In a rare moment of moral lucidity, the Supreme Court, thanks to Bush appointments Roberts and Alido, narrowly restored the ban.

When Clinton wasn’t having the Justice Department persecute anyone safeguarding the unborn, he was having Justice ignore the social damage of pornography, which has obvious links to the culture of death, by demanding that Janet Reno abandon all federal prosecutions of interstate and export sales of pornography resulting in its having become America’s number one export with over 300,000 producers. Wheat is no longer number one; it’s pornography.

Regarding the president, we may ignore any moral imperative to end the genocide Saddam Hussein was practicing, we may ignore the moral imperative to break the cycles of tyranny in the Islamic world, and we may ignore Hussein’s repeated public boasts about having a right to use weapons of mass destruction against the West, but many of us reading The Tablet’s Readers’ Forum are getting properly tired of the unchristian platitudinous rant about the president having frivolously lied.

Despite being a mostly reprehensible institution, the United Nations nevertheless agreed that Hussein had the weapons and might well have an intent to use them, and almost everyone in Congress, who received information less dire than what the president received, were thoroughly convinced of the imminent danger and demanded action. But it does not take much to create amnesia among sanctimonious attitudes. The thousands of tons of nerve gas discovered in Iraq were considerably less than what was feared, but they are not nothing. Anyone who is fair-minded should at least be able to imagine that the motivations of those they criticize may not be dishonorable if their object is anything but mere defamation. To tell a lie requires not a mistake in judgment, even a grave mistake, but a willful intent to deceive, and there is more reason to suspect it exists in those who reproach the president than the president.

Melvin Denton
St. Albans

Good Friend to Catholics

Dear Editor: Sister Camille D’Arienzo in her letter on the death penalty in the Sept. 1 issue reveals a great deal of muddled thinking and is seriously lacking important and clear distinctions.  Restoring the death penalty does not, as she has stated, “go(es) against the teaching of the Catholic Church.”  And, yes, I am aware of the opinion of Pope John Paul II. 

Regardless on which side of the death penalty question one is on, an argument that is not cogent will be at best useless and at worst misleading.

Including Senator Maltese in such a confused and misguided letter casts an undeserved shadow on his reputation. Senator Maltese is the best friend Catholics have in the New York State Senate. He votes staunchly pro-life, is pro-family and pro-Catholic schools, to mention only a few issues.

              Clara Sarrocco
Glendale

Rosary Rally Coverage

Dear Editor: I want to thank you for the excellent coverage of the Rosary Rally at McKinley Park. Linda Busetti gave a good account of the reason for the nationwide effort along with important information about Fatima and the American Need Fatima organization.

I appreciate the detailed story of our group and the events of our two-hour rally. Great shots too, including the extra coverage online!

Thank you from all of us for devoting the time to this and for writing such an encouraging article.

I e-mailed the photo and story links to ANF headquarters in PA. To see other rally photos from across the country, go to tfp.org/gallery2/main.php?-itemld=20966.

Deborah Nuzzo
Brooklyn

The Party of Civil Rights

Dear Editor: Are the Democrats really the party of civil rights? Surely the letter writer was jesting.

Today, the Democrats stand for euthanasia, abortion, alternative marriage, godless governmental (public) education, porn as free speech, forced busing, unhealthy sexual practices, and among many others — laws commanding religious institutions to perform actions violating their beliefs and consciences.

When I see Democrats thumping their chests, I know for whom the bell tolls.

Tom Phillips
Marine Park

The Power of Prayer

Dear Editor: I write this letter very reluctantly. However, our parish deacon insists that I do it, “because while you and I believe in the power of prayer, many people do not and they need to know what happened.”

I am 72 years old and on Aug.15 had a serious heart attack. Because the doctors told my family the heart was very weak, they would have to operate. A double bypass operation took place. Two weeks later, I was sent home.

I was only one hour, when I began to hemmorhage. Before the ambulance arrived, I lost one liter of blood. My brother asked the EMT people, “Will he make it?” They said that they didn’t know if I would make it to the hospital. A nurse of more than 20 years experience told me that she knows of only one other case where someone lost this much blood and lived.

A second operation took place and I was put in intensive care. However, for the next five days, I was unable to eat. When I finally tried to force down food, I was not able to keep it down. A CT scan showed that I had a massive infection in my colon. For the next five days, I was treated with antibiotics and allowed no food or water. It didn’t work. Finally, I was told another major surgery had to take place. Either part or all of my colon had to be removed.

Convinced the end had come, I prepared for what I was sure would be my death.
Nevertheless, I survived this surgery and am now at home after two months in the hospital.

Where does prayer come in? I have a large devout family. Mass cards, rosaries, lit candles, etc., were said for my recovery. With each new surgery or crisis, more Mass cards, rosaries, etc., came pouring in. My fellow lectors from the parish and members of the parish’s Rosary Society, etc., were sending them.

Then, to my astonishment, word came to me that people I didn’t even know were praying for me. For example, one of my sisters persuaded fellow workers to pray for me at the office.

In various parishes and at least one nursing home, Masses were offered for my recovery. My family was notified that the people at America Needs Fatima were praying for me.

In view of this storming of Heaven, I see clearly why I was repeatedly turned back at death’s door. I am more convinced than ever that God is influenced by our prayers.

I hope that this will enable those who are doubtful or skeptical to think again.

James F. Ryan
Brooklyn