Oh, happy reading:
Establishing a parish library

		Grand Mom  Audrey  Mettel Fixmer

Along with our beautiful new church, we will have an extra bonus: a parish library! In spite of the fact that I served on the building committee, I can't take any credit for it. I wasn't involved in the early planning stages, so it came as a surprise to me when I first toured the bare outline of the walls last spring. There we found a cluster of rooms adjacent to the central gathering space and my friend Ron explained, "This is the parish secretary's office, this is a conference room for meetings, and this will be the library."

"You mean a real lending library for parishioners to check out books and read Catholic periodicals?" I was stunned and delighted. I had never been in a parish that had its own library.

Soon after we moved into the church this summer, I agreed to work on the library committee. After all, hadn't a big portion of my life been involved with Catholic literature?

Catholic literature

I thought back to my freshman year at Madonna High School in Aurora, Ill. We had a thriving Sodality of Our Lady at Madonna, and one of the committees was Literature. I was appointed to represent my homeroom on the Literature Committee, and the job stuck. For all four years! It provided me with opportunities to attend CISCA meetings in Chicago and take back ideas to promote Catholic literature.

It was fun for me because I loved reading and all English classes. My favorite teacher was Sister Gregory (English, of course), who instilled the love of good literature in us that followed me throughout my life. Because I wanted to be a writer, Sister Gregory directed me to the College of St. Benedict in Minnesota to study under the famous Catholic literary critic, Sr. Mariella Gable.

Although I married young and did not finish my degree until I was 40, I kept up my reading and writing and my contacts with St. Ben's. I had convinced my husband Bob to finish at St. John's. We stayed in Minnesota after he graduated and was teaching.

Quiet hour

My friend, Pat, graduated from St. Ben's at the same time, and the two of us became "maternity buddies," swapping maternity clothes for the next 15 years through 20 pregnancies, 10 a piece. Together we devised a plan to keep our sanity.

We would have a daily "Mama's Quiet Hour" during which everyone in the household had to lie down and either read or sleep. No TV, no radio. Our preferred reading was spiritual reading to keep us centered. And sane. We got together almost weekly to discuss our reading. It was a time of growth for both of us.

Setting up

Now I can have another burst of growth as I serve on the selection committee for our new parish library. I am excited at the prospect of working with Catholic literature again. At first I could only rejoice at the opportunity to clean out some of our bookcases with our own donations. (My husband is so hooked on books that he can't pass a bookrack without buying still another.)

Then I began reading reviews of new books in some of our Catholic periodicals, and I became excited at the prospect of ordering new books for our library (if someone donates money for acquisitions).

We have a couple of ex-librarians in the parish who are donating hours and hours to the project of cataloguing the books. They have visited a few other parish libraries in the diocese and learned a great deal from them.

Suggestions for library

We would like to make our library available at all hours that the church is open, but seeing how much work is involved makes the value of each book seem monumental. That makes us think we must have a librarian on hand to check out the books and tapes. We have a great team of workers in our parish, but right now we are "strangers in paradise."

How broad should our selection be? Should we include secular fiction as long as it is wholesome? Humor? Should we charge a fine for overdue books as a means of making money? Should we entertain other fundraisers?

Please share your experiences with us. My e-mail address is listed below. Thank you.

"Grandmom" likes hearing from other senior citizens who enjoy aging -- contact information.

It's time:
To end the Roe vs. Wade litmus test for judges

	Life Issues Forum  Susan E. Wills

Nominees to the federal bench were once evaluated on the basis of integrity, legal knowledge and ability, professional experience, and judicial temperament. These are still the American Bar Association's top criteria for assessing judicial fitness.

Unfortunately, some members of the U.S. Senate have reduced the process of vetting judicial nominees to Orwellian simplicity. Remember the motto of Animal Farm - Animals good. Humans bad. The motto of these senators might be summed up as - Defenders of Roe good. Critics of Roe bad.

At least four senators have stated publicly that they will reject any nominee who fails the Roe vs. Wade litmus test. Others have voiced concern over possible nominees whose political views they describe as "extremist" or "out of the mainstream." These are code words for "Critics of Roe bad."

Absurd decision

This is a lot like hiring a geography teacher only if he'll promise to teach that the earth is flat. In both cases you'd be asking a judge or teacher to deny what is obviously true and affirm what is indefensible. The court's decision in Roe vs. Wade is, simply stated, an impoverished and even absurd measure of judicial fitness.

Roe is almost universally acknowledged as being among the worst Supreme Court opinions of the 20th Century. Even Harvard Law Professor Laurence Tribe, who strongly supports legal abortion, has disparaged Roe: "behind its own verbal smokescreen, the substantive judgment on which it rests is nowhere to be found" in the court's decision.

And John Hart Ely, then a Yale Law School professor, famously wrote: Roe is "a very bad decision. . . . It is bad because it is bad constitutional law, or rather because it is not constitutional law and gives almost no sense of an obligation to try to be."

Roe's errors

Seven Supreme Court justices have criticized the Roe decision, including three (Burger, Ginsburg, and O'Connor) who support abortion rights. Scores of law review articles have exposed the opinion's errors of fact, law, and reasoning, but you'll search in vain for one peer-reviewed article defending the decision as written.

Click the Roe vs. Wade button on the USCCB Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities' main page, http://pull.xmr3.com/p/303-8D87/55966618/http-www.usccb.org-prolife.html, to read excerpts from judicial and scholarly critiques of Roe. You'll also find 15 "Roe Reality Checks" debunking popular misconceptions about Roe and abortion generally, links to key abortion decisions, major statements by U.S. bishops on Roe, and a handy bulletin insert called "Roe v. Wade Questions and Answers."

How to help

Over seven million Catholics across the country have already mailed postcards to their senators urging them "not to require support for Roe vs. Wade as a condition for determining a nominee's fitness for judicial office." The National Committee for a Human Life Amendment (NCHLA), a non-profit organization which works closely with the U.S. Catholic bishops, is overseeing this grassroots campaign.

If you want to help end the Roe litmus test, visit http://pull.xmr3.com/p/303-4906/55966616/http-www.endroe.org-.html to locate and send an e-mail message directly to your senators.

Susan E. Wills is associate director for education, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' Secretariat for Pro-Life Activities.