Word: rome
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...peak vacation is a fable of compromises and calculations. On the one hand, there are bargains everywhere: Pan Am has a $398 round trip to London; Alitalia offers five nights in Rome for $99. On average, hotel and air-travel prices can be as much as 30% lower off-season. The trade-off, of course, comes in weather that ranges from unpredictable to appalling. While some resort towns remain mild well into the fall, northern cities turn gray and damp, and a visit requires a victory of mind over weather. The great galleries and cathedrals are often hushed and wonderfully...
American homosexual activists call the dreaded document the "Halloween letter." The directive, issued by the Vatican's doctrinal congregation on Oct. 30, 1986, was approved by Pope John Paul and dispatched to all Roman Catholic bishops around the world. In it, Rome ordered them to withdraw support from any organization that is either "ambiguous" or opposed to the church's teaching that homosexual behavior is sinful. Any hint of endorsement for gay liberation groups, warned Rome, "can be gravely misinterpreted." In particular, allowing them to meet in Catholic churches or schools was deemed "misleading and often scandalous...
...Vatican's main target in the U.S. was Dignity, an organization for gay Catholics that had been allowed to hold special Masses in many dioceses. Prodded by the San Francisco chapter, one of Dignity's largest (250 members), Dignity's next national convention responded defiantly to Rome, declaring that "gay and lesbian people can express their sexuality physically, in a unitive manner that is loving, life-giving and life-affirming...
...Rome's ruling and Dignity's equally blunt response forced the hand of the U.S. hierarchy. Since then, 20 of the country's 187 dioceses have banished Dignity meetings from church premises. Among dioceses with large homosexual populations, the last holdout was San Francisco. But early in November that city's Archbishop, John Quinn, finally summoned the local Dignity leaders to a polite showdown. When they stood by their gay-is-good policy, he informed them that Dec. 18 will mark the last in a 15-year series of Sunday-night Dignity Masses in the city's Catholic churches. Last...
...desert before we return home," said Dignity's national president James Bussen, a Chicago management consultant. San Francisco, he declared, "was the last bastion of the liberal wall to fall." Not quite. Detroit, Milwaukee, Portland, Sacramento and San Antonio, at least, still allow Dignity to meet in church, though Rome's pressure on them is sure to grow. A chapter in Dayton also sponsors public Masses, but it has agreed to accept church teaching...