Letters appearing in the autumn 2019 print issue are marked by a double ##.
Where are the women?
##The summer issue with the cover blurb, “The Women of Notre Dame,” seemed particularly appealing to me. Following Muffet McGraw’s powerful truth about women’s challenges and the limitations we still face, I was thrilled the magazine had taken her words to heart. Here was a chance to celebrate Notre Dame women in all aspects of their experiences. Here was the forum to highlight the accomplishments of women who have embraced the Notre Dame experience and gone on to change the world.
It was, therefore, deeply disappointing to open the magazine and find a short “snapshot” of a female leprechaun, an article on leggings, a short profile of a Notre Dame graduate as a Notre Dame professor, and a five-page overview of issues related to Notre Dame women and the life choices they make. Each of these articles was interesting and well-conceived, but I couldn’t helping thinking, Is this all there is? Almost twice as many pages were devoted to the accomplishments of men.
It would have been so refreshing to find an entire issue focused on the women of Notre Dame. Until it is possible to imagine that happening, the long slog toward equity continues.
Jean Easterly Kuhn ’73SMC
Amherst, Massachusetts
##My issue arrived and I haven’t read a word yet. Intrigued by the cover, I opened it expecting a series of articles about female Domers out in the world. What I saw: 43 photos and images of men; four graduation photos of men and women; and 11 images depicting females — a generous number considering the count includes four women visible only by their leggings, one girls’ soccer team (likely a stock photo) and a pair of drawn female heads. I thought I was going to enjoy a series of articles about the women of Notre Dame and was instead inundated with photos, images and feature articles about men.
Debby Reelitz ’92
North Granby, Connecticut
##I was excited to see what sort of topics would be explored in the “Women of Notre Dame” issue. I’m not sure exactly what I was expecting to read — maybe something about the accomplishments of alumnae, how a Notre Dame education has impacted women, our lasting friendships or thoughtful viewpoints on current women’s issues. Instead, I found a five-page article that primarily focused on marriage and motherhood. While the article was interesting, this narrow focus excludes so many other facets of life that are important to “the women of Notre Dame.”
Erin Gonzalez ’12
New York City
##I was excited to see the summer issue, presumably dedicated to women. However, the opposite actually seemed to be true. The magazine depicted men far more than women. This gender discrepancy is frustrating for any publication, let alone one dubbed “The Women of Notre Dame.” It’s not that exceptional alumnae don’t exist — we do. In great and growing numbers. From my graduating class alone, I know women who are changing lives as principals of urban schools, publishing cutting-edge research on the human brain, fighting legal battles for the rights of immigrants and successfully running their own businesses.
A society built on inequality won’t resolve itself without some added effort. In a time when gender equality matters and appearances have a disproportionate impact on attitudes, I believe Notre Dame has the responsibility to work harder.
Katie Hench ’05, ’11MNA
Chicago
I think there may have been a typo in the title of your most recent issue, “The Women of Notre Dame.” Roughly 90 percent of the photos in this magazine are of men, and three articles actually start with the word “Man”: “Man on the Move,” “Newspaper Man” and “The Man to Consult.”
On page 60, the start of “The Classes” section, which arguably could have included at least one woman, actually includes 100 percent white male students.
Kristin Schwarz-Whitney ’07
Quincy, Massachusetts
I was so delighted and amazed to receive the Notre Dame Magazine titled, “The Women of Notre Dame.” I even waited to read it, excited at what was included. As a proud alumna of the Class of ’73, I was extremely disappointed in the contents.
“A Sisterhood of Sorts” read more like a newspaper article on the gender gap. There was so little about ND women, it was shocking. Even the illustrations were strange: legs and curvy body parts. Is that what the women of ND are?
The rest of the magazine did a superb job of featuring MEN: Woodstock men, newspaper man, Lincoln, priest, “Man in Motion,” etc. Even the graduation pictures were all men. Where were the “Women of Notre Dame”?
The best article in the magazine was the editor’s note (“Finding your own way”). It was an excellent example of what we ‘pioneer’ women lived through in the ’60s and ’70s. Yes, we’ve come a long way, baby. But let’s try a little harder to show what the ND ladies are doing.
Katie Kolar Silva ’73
Atlanta
While I enjoyed your article regarding the many different paths female graduates of du Lac have journeyed since their graduation, I just couldn’t get past the fact you had to utilize a “pink” cover to highlight the article. Really?
I was in one of the early classes and vividly remember the extra efforts my female peers needed to put forth in order not to be thought of as “weaker.”
Pink connotes all the attributes we worked to dismiss at ND and during our careers. How about something a bit less gender stereotypical?
Lauretta M. Reising’78
Deerfield, Illinois
As the first female graduate in four generations of Wolf Domers, I was always quite aware of what it meant to attend the University. As such, it was with excitement that I received the summer edition of Notre Dame Magazine. A feature story on “The Women of Notre Dame”! The best the magazine had to offer on the cover, however, was the ever-tired pink trope with a green shamrock. I can think of approximately 1,000,000 better ways to represent women — especially women with degrees from this fine University. I was further disappointed that the accompanying “Sisterhood of Sorts” article was ultimately yet another gender snoozer.
While the challenges of “having it all” are quite real, it’s neither particularly singular to the lady Irish nor would this topic be explored as a feature story for men. And yet it seems that the magazine feels that our decisions on some combination of marriage, kids and career is most representative of how far we’ve come since the first coed graduating class. I would love to read about what the University is doing to better support women after graduation. (Anything?) I would love an in-depth profile on our female graduates. I would love to see something, anything, with more substance.
Caitlin (Wolf) Abramson ’02
Clarendon Hills, Illinois
As a proud alumna, I was excited to see the latest cover of Notre Dame Magazine and assumed it would be focused on the amazing women graduates from the last 40-plus years. Of the 10 featured articles, one was dedicated to the alumnae and one highlighted the great work being done by Laura Miller-Graff ’08. Twenty percent of the featured articles were about “The Women of Notre Dame.” “Domers in the News” section had 8 entries — one woman. The spring edition has a similar focus: 18 Domers, of whom two were women.
Nothing on the amazing run of the women’s basketball team to the championship game — and how magnificently they have represented Notre Dame. Nothing about the newsworthy response from Muffet McGraw when asked why she had an all-female staff. I certainly saw it across the news and social media for weeks because it was AMAZING. Nothing about notable diverse alumnae doing great things in the world.
Women graduates are no longer a novelty, and we have used our education to success across the spectrum in the 47 years since coeducation, so certainly there were enough stories to fill an issue. It’s very disappointing that you didn’t find a way to do that.
Tricia Brennan Stewart ’78
Geneva, Illinois
Thank you for the pink issue of your magazine. I was shocked to see the amount of housework done by men and women. Ten and a half hours for men, much of it in the yard? Notre Dame alumni need to think about condominium living or other housing arrangements to get this number down. That is entirely too much housework.
As for the assertion that Condoleezza Rice is Notre Dame’s most prominent alumna, I would like to put a shout out to Hannah from Atlanta, aka Hannah Storm ’83, America’s greatest sports journalist of our age — male or female.
Timothy M.B. Farrell ’85
Washington, D.C.
“A Sisterhood of Sorts” has drawn me into the ongoing Notre Dame family debate on how Catholic Our Lady’s university should be. A thoughtful article, to be sure, but Sarah Cahalan offered nothing new to the half-century discussion, but merely followed the standard talking points we hear in the media and from academia. She made little effort to bring the wisdom of Catholicism into the discussion; rather, she followed the line of thought from the secular world at large (with a few pertinent voices of alumnae added in).
Will Notre Dame always follow, or will it gather the courage to lead? It seems evident that the “wisdom of the world” is failing to solve our problems. Look around. It is hard to deny that our problems are getting worse. If anything, the elite universities have become part of the problem instead of a source for solutions. And the promise of technology is ephemeral. Are we missing something?
As the world’s wisdom continues to fail us, Notre Dame has the opportunity to break away from following and double-down in its unique charism: its Catholicity. Trying to nuance this extraordinary resource in order to maintain high standing among the elites will result in Notre Dame being just another elite university. We have plenty of those.
Administration and faculty: Seize the moment. Be fully Catholic. Lead. Unleash the full scholarly and pastoral resources of this institution in bringing the truth of the Incarnation to bear on our problems. It is the expulsion of God from the public and academic squares that has gotten us so deep into our messes. This country needs a strong institution to stand up with courage and say, we see a better way. Why not Notre Dame?
To follow the elite universities, with all their attendant multiculturalism, identity politics, and mind-boggling orthodoxies, is to go with them over a cliff. Covering up the Columbus murals is to follow. To look at all our ever-widening social problems in terms only of rights or class struggle is to follow. To acquiesce in the prevailing definition of freedom as the prerogative to do whatever we choose, is to follow. To reflect and proclaim on how the infinite love of the Trinity offers the key to resolving our issues is to lead. It is possible to proclaim the gospel message and also to be a leading research university — so long as these two endeavors are not considered separate.
Yes, there would be a cost. But as this world continues to spin toward madness, Notre Dame will have to choose: follow or try to lead. The fence is unsustainable.
I humbly admit that I do not know how to resolve the challenges women face today. But I would love to see Notre Dame break out of the same ol’, same ol’, and bring to bear its considerable acumen, fully under its charism of Catholicity, to blaze a new and perhaps more effective trail in addressing them.
Randall Petrides ’77J.D.
Grand Blanc, Michigan
I was sad and very disappointed to see the newest edition with the pink cover featuring “The Women of Notre Dame.” I gave a cursory look inside thinking I would actually see several faces of the writers and other women of Notre Dame. I did see the legs of some of women on page 9, and I did see a photo of “Lady Luck Leprechaun.” I also saw a woman (I think) on page 18 and on page 45. I saw what appears to be the back of a woman on page 46. Finally on page 71, a tiny face of a female graduate. That’s it? This is the “Women of Notre Dame”? THAT IS PATHETIC.
This is a visual society. Show me some of the faces of the women of Notre Dame. Haven’t we come further than this?
Jeanne Simoni
Davie, Florida
I was startled by the pink cover (who made that decision?) and thought this issue might be of interest to me, who was in the second class of graduate students in the Master of Arts in Teaching program, which existed from 1960 until, I think, 1963. We were funded by the Ford Foundation and were the first group of women who were not associated with a religious order to get degrees at Notre Dame. We knew women had attended ND for summer courses for many years and we were glad that they had led the way for our arrival.
In my class there were eight women and we studied for 15 months of hard work in our fields and served internships in local high schools. There have been a few articles about women at Notre Dame, but none have every mentioned us and our contributions toward Notre Dame becoming the coeducational institution it is today.
I don’t know how we got lost in the archives. We really were students and sat in the student section at football games, were not allowed to swim in the Rockne, were thrown off the tennis courts and, of course, the golf course. When I complained about the tennis courts to the athletic department, no action was taken. When I saw Father Hesburgh on the top of the alumni steps of the administration building, I walked up the forbidden stairs and talked to him; things began to change but we never did get restrooms. Guys sensitive to our need were helpful in watching the door so we could use the men’s facilities.
I loved my time at Notre Dame. I went on to get other degrees and finally got a D.Min. from the Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley.
I was disappointed that the article focused so much on the decisions about marriage and family. I think the men of Notre Dame also are challenged by that today. I also married a graduate student who has three degrees from Notre Dame, and we had five children in six years (some of those early years in graduate student housing) but it never seemed that I was not using my degrees as a mother, and with a very supportive spouse I continued to study . . . still do.
Please do not forget those of us who walked God Quad and cheered in the stadium all those years ago.
Catharine Stewart-Roche ’62M.A.
Socorro, New Mexico
Would it have seemed amiss to have mentioned religious sisters — who attended Notre Dame years and years ago? Educating sisters was considered a contribution to Catholic education.
Sister Pauline Zeleznik, SSJ, ’64Ph.D.
Kalamazoo, Michigan
When I read the summer issue I was fully expecting to see numerous substantive articles about this theme, but was disappointed to see very little content consistent with the headline on the cover. I was intending to write a letter to express my disappointment but never found the time. I was reminded of my disappointment when I read the four letters that appear in the fall issue, particularly noting that all four were written by women who attended ND and SMC. While too late to have my letter appear in the winter print edition (based on your policy), I thought I'd send along my comments with the hopes that you can post along with any other letters that appear online. I think it's important to have these women, and all others who attended ND, know that at least one male graduate shares their expressed disappointment. Perhaps an apology from the editor is in order?
Brian O'Herlihy '76
Wayland, Massachusetts
Paying the price
##I was happy to see the informative piece (“Affording Opportunity”) that the average Notre Dame student graduates with just $22,000 in student-loan debt. However, we can do better than that. Notre Dame alumni are very generous. When I attended my 40th reunion last year, the student working in our dorm had just graduated with a $50,000 student-loan debt. His father worked at Home Depot and his mother worked at CVS. He had not landed a job yet. That bothered me.
The three new magnificent buildings attached to the stadium are impressive. But it would be more impressive if all Notre Dame students graduated debt-free with no student loans.
Paul Coppola ’78
Washington, D.C.
##I read with interest the article on how the University helps low-income families shoulder the burdensome cost of a Notre Dame education. I certainly appreciate what the University is doing today, but I believe there is more to the story that needs to be told.
I grew up in Youngstown, Ohio. My father was a refrigeration mechanic and my mother was a clerk at a department store. My parents earned less than $6,000 per year (the Census Bureau indicates average annual household income then at $5,400). There wasn’t much to go around, but my parents sacrificed and made it a priority for my two sisters and me to go to college. Notre Dame tuition, room and board back then was about $2,000 a year. That said, I got a first-rate education for about one-third of our family’s annual income.
According to the article, today’s annual household income is $61,372, and Notre Dame’s annual tuition, room and board is $74,193 — or 121 percent of today’s annual household income. Is the education better today? It certainly costs significantly more.
I’d like to suggest the 2020 budget committee do a comparison to the 1960 budget to identify the sources of growth. If the 2019 annual household income is 11 times greater than in 1959, then it would seem reasonable that tuition should be about 11 times higher, or about $22,000 a year. A Catholic university should lead in reducing the family tuition burden.
John Srnec ’63
Highlands Ranch, Colorado
##I calculate that if annual tuition is $55,000 and if a student takes the average course load of 30 credits, then the student pays $5,500 for each three-credit course. As an undergraduate at Notre Dame, I had a number of classes that had well over 100 students. That means the University receives $550,000 for that one course. Perhaps, rather than having tuition that excludes many middle- and lower-income students from even considering Notre Dame, the tuition should be more fairly priced. This would, of course, preclude the University from taking credit for giving over $100 million in need-based scholarships. Perhaps this is old-fashioned thinking.
Alan G. Gasner, M.D. ’68
Winter Haven, Florida
The real first leprechaun
##Congratulations to the first lady leprechaun (“Lady Luck and Other Leprechaunia”). However, your story is wrong regarding the history of this Irish icon. It suggests that John Brand ’65 was the first. Not true. The first was Terry Crawford, back in 1961. Fact is, I was one of the cheerleaders who helped pick Terry as the very first. Terry ran around the field after each touchdown with Clashmore Mike, the Irish Terrier mascot of that era.
Joe Zeller ’62
South Barrington, Illinois
Childhood trauma
##It was encouraging to see two pieces in the summer issue (“The Lost Virtue” and “A Remedy for Battered Hearts”) about toxic stress and how to survive it, but surprising to see neither author mention Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE) research or Nadine Burke Harris’ groundbreaking book, The Deepest Well. The book shows the potential damage to our health — lifelong — that ACEs deliver and offers additional weapons Laura Miller-Graff and her team can take to the fight for resilience. Parents and children everywhere need help, and those of us wanting to see them get it must keep on sharing the word that programs like Australia’s Every Child are worth supporting, following, adopting and improving until every child everywhere thrives.
Lyn Relph ’61
Tucson, Arizona
The martyrs
##John Rosengren’s insightful story of Father Stan Rother (“The Good Shepherd”) brought me back to Lago Atitlán and Guatemala. We were staying in San Pedro, less than 10 miles from his parish, when he was murdered in 1981. I witnessed the heavy army presence. I didn’t learn of his death until a week later in a local newspaper. We did visit his church and found its unique inclusion of a Mayan tapestry of loaves and fishes. Neither Ronald Reagan nor Pope John Paul II showed much sympathy for the martyred priest and his people. The U.S. government armed and trained the militias of Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador. The list of their victims, from St. Oscar Romero to tens of thousands of peasants, should give us all pause to reflect and speak out against injustice.
Pete McHugh ’76
New Orleans
Oklahoma is home (at least it was — I have lived in Maryland for over 10 years now). My parents live in Oklahoma City and are part of the archdiocese, and I have heard so many snippets of Father Rother’s story in the lead-up to the Mass celebrating his beatification. There is so much joy that one of their own is being considered for canonization — I sent the link to my parents to share with their community — but I also greatly appreciate reading of the love for this man from his flock in Guatemala. Thank you for bringing his story to this magazine!
Rebecca Chimahusky ’05
Silver Spring, Maryland
Helping those less fortunate?
##The announcement that Paul Ryan, former speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, will be on campus as a visiting professor (“Class Speaker”) gives me pause. Other than seeking and reaching high office in the federal government, what exactly has Mr. Ryan accomplished matching the University’s mission or Christian ideals that qualifies him as a guest lecturer? My undergraduate university, St. Bonaventure University, is a Franciscan school that very much emphasized the Franciscan traditions, especially helping the downtrodden and less fortunate. When I recall the 2017 tax cuts, led through Congress by Mr. Ryan, I do not see examples of the spirit of St. Francis or any Franciscan ideals. Ditto the party-of-Trump’s moves to eliminate or curtail health-care benefits for many Americans, in which Mr. Ryan played a major role. I am quite disappointed the University thinks Paul Ryan’s presence on campus will add value or knowledge.
Dennis J. Sheehan ’70MBA
Indio, California
You report that Speaker Ryan will be lecturing on “the fundamentals of American government, political polarization, and Catholicism and economics.”
Perchance will he have time to address honor, integrity and courage — three qualities that he seldom if ever exhibited?
Paul Hughes-Cromwick ’78
Ann Arbor, Michigan
Care for the vulnerable
I was inspired reading about Archbishop Borys Gudziak receiving the Notre Dame Award, presented to “men and women whose life and deeds have shown exemplary dedication to the ideals for which the University stands: faith, inquiry, education, justice, public service, peace and care for the most vulnerable.” Gudziak said, “We can speak with the wisdom of the Church and with the knowledge of the school. We can witness and stand and swim against the current.”
Will Father Jenkins speak loudly with the wisdom of the Church and swim against the current that is today’s hypersecular culture of death? How can we say the “care for the most vulnerable” is an ideal the University stands for when the actions of the University regarding the culture of life have been suspect?
Father Jenkins’s February 7, 2019, statement, “Who’s Next?” on the passage of New York’s radical pro-abortion bill was quite ironic. Thirty-five years ago Notre Dame laid the groundwork, in part, for such a law when then-governor of New York Mario Cuomo was invited to campus to give his rationalization for supporting abortion in New York. Honoring President Obama with an honorary degree and conferring the Laetare Medal on his vice president was a continuation of the sellout.
In 1994, Notre Dame honored Jean Vanier with the Notre Dame Award. Vanier showed what one person can do to care for the most vulnerable, establishing L’Arche communities around the world. The people that he and others lived with in L’Arche homes are the same people often targeted for death before being born by the radical pro-abortion apologists. We can learn from Vanier’s actions to protect the weak and promote a culture of life. But will we stand up and do it ourselves?
Stephen O’Neil ’87
Indianapolis
Kids and sports
I am perplexed by what Maraya Steadman wrote in “This might hurt a lot.” It is our duty as parents to introduce our children to activities that promote their well-being and that do not put them at risk for undue harm. Just as we would not encourage our teens to sample street drugs, drive recklessly or purge after meals, we should not enable them to injure themselves through year-round participation in contact sports. When we indulge our children to make them happy in the face of statistics and medical science, we abdicate our primary role as parents. Worrying, lighting candles and praying are not the answer to preventing traumatic brain injury. Sometimes as parents we have to say no.
Lara Dolphin ’96
Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania
Leggings redux
I’m writing to correct an error in the summer 2019 issue. It was stated (“‘Athleisure’ and Its Discontents”) that I had written my letter to The Observer (about the problematic aspects of leggings) . . . and then disappeared. This is untrue. If a real search for Mary Ann White had begun, it would have ended with my contact information. I gave The Observer permission to provide my email address in response to media inquiries — Notre Dame Magazine was not amongst them. The Observer asked that I consider giving my response to them first.
The magazine stated that I never surfaced to defend my position. This is inaccurate. I wrote and sent a second letter. The Observer chose not to print it. However, in an instance of unsportsmanlike conduct on their part, they did find space for an editorial response to my unpublished letter.
It was also suggested by magazine that my letter stated that women bear the responsibility for men’s behavior. This is simply untrue.
The unhappiest implication of the piece is that because I am not immediately doxable, the points I made are dismissible. How much more interesting it would have been to discuss the root issue: Is there a real difference in outcome between a man objectifying a woman and a woman objectifying herself?
I shared my unpublished second letter with author Suzanne Venker (with whom I became acquainted online as a result of an article she wrote about the leggings furor). She published it on her blog.
Mary Ann White
Detroit
Woodstock
I read through “The Day the Music Lived” with sadness and dismay.
Did you know that during that infamous week, 126 soldiers were killed in Vietnam — 126 sons, brothers, husbands — and to this day, no one cares about any of them. And yet you choose to glorify the brain-dead, dope-smoking morons wallowing in their feces and vomit as the symbol of what America stands for.
Shame on you. Our Lady weeps.
James J. Lewanski ’65
La Mesa, California
Heart of virtue
The first part of “The Lost Virtue” searched for examples and definitions of greatness of soul in men only, and the history of men only. It wasn’t until a woman’s perspective on the greatness of soul, and on the unconditional love needed for the raising of a healthy child (primarily a woman's job) in an environment of safety and loving care, that the recipe for greatness of soul (perhaps also known as “secure attachment”) gains clarity.
Susan G. Hall
Hometown unknown
Farewell, Noel
I was disappointed to read in the summer issue of the passing of my dear old friend, Noel O’Sullivan (“Deaths in the family”). Noel’s passing deserves more than a footnote because he is a unique Notre Dame story . . . the Elizabeth, New Jersey, guy that came to Notre Dame for an education and never left.
We first met in 1956 when we both lived in Badin Hall. I was a 19-year-old kid from Chicago and Noel was a 25-year-old Korean War combat veteran. (I didn’t find out about the combat part until much later.) Noel, like many others at the time, came to ND on the G.I. bill. He had not attended school since high school, a massive, seven-year span. He could barely believe that he was now a student at “Notra Dahm” . . . his revered pronunciation. It’s an understatement to say that he struggled with his academic load, but Noel was not to be denied his “fairy tale” existence at this special place in his heart.
In spite of his academic struggles, Noel went out for the track team as a 440 man, the distance prior to the 400 meters of today. Now, Noel didn’t exactly have the body of a track man, at roughly 5-foot-7 (and maybe a bit pudgy). But he had tremendous determination and the passion to succeed. What set him apart was his genuine enthusiasm. He was a constant cheerleader for everyone, the consummate motivator. I do think that’s why he made the team. He was the hard-working upbeat guy we all wanted to be around. He certainly was all of that for me.
Some years later I read he was our golf coach. My first reaction was, “What? How could that be?” Eliazbeth is a heavily industrial city, and I doubt Noel ever stepped on a golf course in his growing-up years. The answer is obvious. Noel was an Irishman, a New Jersey Irishman with certain undeniable gifts. His zeal, grit, determination and enthusiasm, his love of teaching (and maybe his gift of gab), could and did overcome any obstacles.
Noel fell in love with Notre Dame in 1956 and the love affair never ended until his death. He made an important impact on me, and I’m sure so many on his track team, golf teams and the many students whose lives he touched. Rest in peace, my friend!
Ron Gordon ’59
Omaha, Nebraska
More on the murals
Publishing such a negative portrayal of Columbus as the magazine did in its spring issue (“When the past presents problems”) on the basis of a post hoc, mistaken generalization is deeply misleading and unfair. You are unwise to ascribe the totality of atrocities and injustices to Columbus simply because he was the first European to arrive in the New World. It is this same kind of distorted reasoning that also led the writer, Jason Kelly, to make other inaccurate accusations that he claims were committed by “Columbus’ own hands.”
I firmly believe that Notre Dame Magazine and President Jenkins need to tell “the full story,” and not hide, in Professor Moevs words, behind “a curtain [that] can be easy and cheap, both intellectually and financially.” Last, contrary to your view, Mr. Kelly, the “past [does not always] present problems” if “the full story” is told about Christopher Columbus and Notre Dame University.
Michael Giammarella
New York City
Professor Giammarella’s full, 5,200-word letter detailing his objections to the story is available in this PDF document.
Challenge us
Thank you very much for the summer issue of Notre Dame Magazine. I’ve already enjoyed it immensely.
“The Good Shepherd” reminded me of the book, The Art of Political Murder, about the assassination of a Guatemalan bishop. I’ve also read “A Remedy for Battered Hearts” and will read “Playing for Keeps” and maybe “A Sisterhood of Sorts.”
I’m addicted to “tough reads,” or reading about difficult topics. Examples: Dark Money by Jane Mayer, The Doomsday Machine by Daniel Ellsberg, and on and on. I’d like Notre Dame Magazine to include as much hard reading as it can without losing significant numbers of readers. Journalism is precious.
Bill Herber ’58
Seattle