Re: “Awaken consciences” (Editorial, March 25). 

I believe your comment in regard to Rush Limbaugh was totally degrading to Our Sunday Visitor. I would want to know if the young woman in question was bragging or complaining. You bring up the question about conservatives in general. I’m having serious thought about your editorial board.  

The trouble with the Catholic Church is very liberal Catholics not knowing their faith. 

— Jay Kepner, Bermuda Dunes, Calif.

Holy Land injustice

Re: “In the footsteps of Christ” (Faith, March 11). 

I am grateful for Sarah Hayes sharing of spirituality with us in walking the Via Dolorosa, but I was struck by two things: no mention of the Palestinian Christians, the “living stones,” and always referring to the land as “Israel,” not the “Holy Land.” The indigenous Christians live the Way of the Cross, and while they weren’t the focus of the article, completely ignoring them serves the Israel Ministry of Tourism’s agenda (who paid for the trip) of ignoring and erasing Palestinian identity, thereby separating spirituality from solidarity. Also, the more ancient usage for Christian pilgrims is “the Holy Land.” To only use “Israel” is a subtle (albeit unintended) way to, again, play into hands of Israel’s agenda to foster a private piety that is oblivious to the injustice on the ground. It’s another instance of our Catholic media ignoring the plight of the Mother Church of Jerusalem. 

— Father Alex Kratz, O.F.M. Detroit, Mich.

Pill’s health effects

Regarding the issue of Obama’s contraceptive mandate: Given its human reproductive and destructive dimensions, in addition to being an obviously valid object for the Church’s analysis of moral behavior, contraception is a biologic/medical health concern as well. 

As discussed at an international workshop for obstetricians and gynecologists sponsored in Rome late last year by MaterCare International, an organization of primarily Catholic physicians whose “presumption is for the woman,” there are numerous health-related aspects to (especially) hormonal contraception. Birth control agents (BCPs) are the first prescribed “medication” developed to disrupt the natural hormonal feedback mechanisms of a woman’s finely tuned biology. They were originally hyper-marketed by providing pre-printed prescriptions that required no thinking by the physician, other than how to sign them — also a first. 

Altogether, some 120 metabolic processes are changed by the pill. Among the consequences of hormonal contraception discussed at the conference were their “physical” side effects; these include promotion of sexually-transmitted infections (some leading to tubal obstruction, ectopic pregnancy and infertility), venous thromboembolism, cervical cancer (up to double the usual rate), cancer of the breast and liver (estrogen is listed as a class II carcinogen by the World Health Organization), diabetes and osteoporosis. Mental disorders, including depression, suicide and personality changes, have been associated with use of the pill, while disorders in sexuality have also followed its production of a state of false hormonal pregnancy.  

— W. A. Krotoski, M.D., Ph.D., M.P.H., Baton Rouge, La.

Active participants

Re: “Are you lonely in your parish?” (Openers, March 25). 

My wife volunteered as a greeter in more than one parish but the effort was like pulling teeth. She crossed the aisle last Sunday to carry the “Kiss of Peace” to a frail elderly friend sitting alone in her pew and was viewed by others as some kind of weirdo. But then we are relatively recent transplants from the West to central Pennsylvania and not qualified to judge. 

All due respect to Benedict XVI and his gentle reforms, I find it extremely difficult to erase what I learned from Vatican II that the Mass is an invitation to join our Lord at his banquet around the table of the altar. 

“The Church therefore, earnestly desires that Christ’s faithful, when present at this mystery of faith, should not there, as strangers or silent spectators. On the contrary ... they should participate knowingly, devoutly and actively. They should be instructed by God’s word and be refreshed at the table of the Lord’s body ...” (Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, No. 48).