The scandal caused by the sexual abuse of young people by members of the Catholic clergy has made the laity take a new and critical look at the way their church operates. While the vast majority of Catholics have remained loyal to the church, many have a clear sense that something is seriously wrong
When the Catholic Bishops of the United States adopted the Charter for the Protection of Children and Young People in June 2002, they included a provision calling for a review of the charter in two years. An Ad Hoc Committee on Sexual Abuse (A.H.C.S.A.), established for this purpose by the U.S. Conf
The Hubble Telescope recently peered as deep into space as humans have ever looked. Officials of the Space Telescope Science Institute traced light that has been speeding toward the space we now occupy for 13 billion years, to within a stone’s throw of the beginning of the universe. In order t
Smoking began for me at 16. My friends started then too, and because it was forbidden on school grounds, the incentive of rule-breaking made it all the more attractive. After starting with Pall Malls and then Marlboros, I went on to Salems in graduate school, where any nonsmoking student was viewed
Posture, Not Policy
I have become increasingly confused by the demand of Catholic thinkers like Germain Grisez (Catholic Politicians and Abortion Funding, 8/30) that we should be steadfastly opposed to abortion. I am appalled at the widespread practice of abortion in the United
In a famous essay published in Thought in 1955, Msgr. John Tracy Ellis lamented the lack of intellectual achievement on the part of second- and third-generation American Catholics. Conditions have changed markedly since Ellis wrote. Today Catholics can be found on the faculties of the best American
Money is a subject that has always held endless difficulty and fascination for me. At 20 I entered a convent, embracing a sacred vow of poverty and refusing to have anything to do with owning money. At 38, I left that order and had to face financial reality again. I worked in the service of the chur