The Greatest Story

Thank you very much for your magazine. I am very sorry to hear of Father Hardon’s passing away. He will remain in our prayers.

Thank you as well for the fine article by Vivian Dudro, in your recent issue. It was thoughtful and well written. Although it was about children’s literature, the article drove home a number of points applicable to catechesis and evangelization. Stories are potent and can be used in conjunction with other modes of instruction to form people in the faith. I don’t mean to suggest that reading stories should supplant systematic study and instruction. But story-reading and story-telling can be used in conjunction with more conventional methods of catechesis to drive home a point or to enlarge a person’s vision of the world and thus make him more disposed to the faith.

Perhaps The Catholic Faith could explore this aspect of catechesis in more detail.

Sincerely,

Alma Bevan
St. Lucia, WI

Choose Life

For those Catholics who may have any doubts about the evil of abortion, for those women who might say, “It’s my body and why shouldn’t I have the right to choose,” please think, really—think about that statement. The word “choose” here really means choosing life or death for someone else. The life being aborted is not your body at all, by any stretch of the imagination, but a completely separate entity. You and your body may be going out to dinner a few days after the procedure, or to a movie, or back to work, but the tiny human being that was thrown in the pail will never be doing these things. He or she will never have the chance to experience childhood, friendship, love, or parenthood. Possibly 70 or 80 years of a life, and who knows what unexpected potential may have been fulfilled in that life, tossed in a pail by someone who says, “It’s my body.”

We don’t have the right to dispose of the unwanted, whether they be unborn infants, the aged or chronically ill, or anyone else we consider to be an unacceptable burden, an obstacle standing in the way of our own well-being or happiness. And as Catholics who believe that God instills an immortal soul into each life He creates, and in the sanctity of that life with all that that implies, you already know the truth in your heart.

Sincerely,

Joan C. Kelly
North Providence, RI

Keeping Up

I very much appreciate your magazine. Though I am getting up there in years and have trouble reading, I still try to keep up on things in the Church. So much has changed in the world and in the Catholic Church since my day. But the Church is ever ancient and ever new.

Our holy Faith is so important. In the end, it is what we do for God that counts. Unfortunately, it often takes many years before people realize this. As someone once said, “Youth is wasted on the young.”

Please know that your magazine is in my prayers.

Sincerely,

Virginia Calhoun
Arnold, MO