To the editor:
As we commemorate the horrors of nuclear war and the deaths of thousands of civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki on August 6 and 9, it is particularly hopeful to hear Archbishop Edwin O’Brien of Baltimore (former Archbishop for the Military Services) speak on Catholic social teaching regarding nuclear weapons and their use as deterrents.
To the editor:
I want to comment on the end-of-life options provision in the House bill H.R. 3200, America’s Affordable Health Choices Act of 2009.
If there would be a feastday for grandparents, it would probably be July 26. That is the feast of Sts. Joachim and Anne, the parents of our Blessed Mother.
As a new grandparent myself with two granddaughters born last year, I was happy to hear Pope Benedict XVI mention the importance of grandparents July 26 during his Sunday Angelus talk in the mountains of Italy, where he is vacationing.
To the editor:
On May 17 of this year, President Barack Obama gave the commencement address and received an honorary law degree from the University of Notre Dame. Fr. John Jenkins, president of Notre Dame, also gave President Obama a framed picture of the late Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. marching with the former long-time president of Notre Dame, Fr. Theodore Hesburgh.
During his address, President Obama, a huge supporter of abortion rights, asked, “How does each of us remain firm in our principles, and fight for what we consider right, without demonizing those with just as strongly held convictions on the other side?”
To the editor:
Reading the front page of the July 16 issue of the Catholic Herald reinvigorates the already acknowledged practice of the Catholic Church of serving thy neighbor.
As an occasional volunteer at the dinner serving this past summer at the Catholic Multicultural Center, I was particularly taken aback when I was informed that the center was to be closed. It struck me like the crack of a thunderbolt of lightning. I couldn’t believe it.
Health care is a basic human right alongside food and shelter. All persons in the United States should be able to access good, affordable health care.
The injustice of millions of people in our country lacking access to health care must be remedied, says the Catholic Health Association (CHA) in its vision for Catholic health care reform.
Pope Benedict XVI has been writing an encyclical on charity for some time. But in releasing the encyclical Caritas in Veritate (“Charity in Truth”) on July 7, it looks as if the Holy Father is responding to our current world economic crisis.
His words are certainly prophetic and inspiring. In fact, they should be assigned reading for not only members of the Catholic Church, but also for leaders of every nation, business executives, workers . . . well, everybody!
To the editor:
Thanks much for including the excellent article by Fr. John Dietzen titled “Being an ‘authentic’ Catholic” (July 2 edition). In very few words, he expressed well that we have a large Church that is “at its best and most alive when there has been a whole rainbow of ways for people to pray, to think, to live out their faith, and grow in holiness.”
Many of us celebrate the July 4th holiday with family picnics or other fun activities. I imagine few of us take time to reflect on the meaning of this holiday and its significance in our lives.
However, with news reports about the recent political upheaval in Iran, I began thinking how lucky we are to live in the United States of America. We owe our freedom and democratic system of government to the earliest Americans. They had to fight to establish this country — and we should fight (not necessarily in the physical sense) to preserve the freedoms they gained for us.
In my 35+ years on the staff of the Catholic Herald, I have had the privilege of getting to know many priests in the Diocese of Madison.
