Back in my wee home town, McCook, Nebraska, a writer with the McCook Daily Gazette wrote a column regarding the papacy and Catholicism in general. Two days later, the paper ran a letter to the editor in defense of the Church, followed by another one after the weekend. My source tells me that two more Catholics’ letters were published, though they were put into a Religion section, not the Opinion section on the second page, where the column and the first two letters appeared. Apparently quite a few private letters came to the author as well.
I think one could raise some interesting questions regarding the paper running the column in the first place (the author is not sorry), but more interesting to me are the responses. After the relatively large response, our dear pastor of St. Patrick (make a website already, Father!), Fr. Brethour, had an Idea. The Idea involves parishioners writing articles to dispose of such misinformation and misconceptions regarding Catholicism.
This is all music to my ears. It reminds me of Catholic Answers’ humble beginnings (this is from memory; forgive me if I’ve missed anything): Karl Keating, upon leaving Mass one day, found anti-Catholic pamphlets left on the cars in the parking lot. He wrote pamphlets to counter them, got a PO Box and said to address letters to “Catholic Answers,” and the rest is history.
The morals of the McCook story are: a) Catholics in increasing numbers are having a grip on the Faith, b) this is Very Exciting, and c) you don’t write about this “progressive” crap in the Lincoln Diocese and get away with it.