Replies

Our newspaper published a screed today by Anna Quindlen castigating the bishops who have taken a courageous stand on this issue. Our wonderful paper has had a vendetta against the Catholic Church at least as long as I have lived here. They can't heap enough praise on the pro-abortionists and those who favor gay marriage. Those who disagree are evil and lack compassion.

What I want to know is when did receiving Communion in the Catholic Church become a "right," regardless of the state of your soul? I am a pre-VII fossilette and at Mass only about half the people present would actually receive. No one would dare approach the altar rail unless they had been to Confession and had made a firm commitment to amend his or her life. When did Catholics start emptying out the pews and filing up to receive no matter what kind of sin they are involved in and who encouraged this? My memory fails me. This business with pro-abort politicians would not even have become an issue in the old "benighted" Church.

Church leaders need to take responsibility to defend Catholic culture and civilization. It is true that they are entrusted with a spiritual and moral mission which relates to individuals, but Catholic institutions must also be defended from debasement and Catholics should be defended from hostile assaults by secular humanists and other enemies of the faith. The extreme privatization of religion and morality in modern America, as if Christian morality had no public role, must end.