Letters

Belonging

As clergy serving communities of faith in Chestnut Hill, we reject the statement published in the Chestnut Hill Local on October 2, 2003, that the Christian and biblical witness "categorically condemns" homosexuality. We proclaim God's presence in all human love, no matter what the sexual orientation.

We further claim as our own a broad and deep stream of biblical witness and Christian tradition that affirms God's love for all people and Jesus' embrace of all those who are oppressed. While acknowledging that contemporary Christian opinions on issues of sexual orientation differ widely, we as Christian clergy in Chestnut Hill associate ourselves with the full belonging of persons of gay, straight, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered orientations.

Brigitte Boyle, Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill
James Dever, Our Mother of Consolation Roman Catholic Church
John Francis, St. Paul's Episcopal Church
Beth Hixon, St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Cynthia Jarvis, Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill
Linda Noonan, Chestnut Hill United Methodist Church
Anita Schell-Lambert, St. Paul's Episcopal Church
John Saraka, Christ Ascension Lutheran Church
Robert Tate, St. Martin-in-the-Fields Episcopal Church
Hal Taussig, Chestnut Hill United Methodist Church

No bias

I was distressed by the comments of “Name Withheld by Request” (letters to Local, October 2) chastising Local editors for featuring a picture of Mayor Street with CHCA Black & White Gala committee members on the front page of the September 25 paper. “Name Withheld” felt that the Local, and by implication, the CHCA, was playing favorites in the mayor’s race since a previous edition had not given the opening of Mr. Katz’s Chestnut Hill campaign office identical front page exposure.
As a past president of the CHCA, I can assure “Name Withheld” that neither the paper nor the association have any such bias.
Since the Local is published by the CHCA, and both paper and association serve the community, its first focus is always literally “local” news. It is traditional editorial policy to celebrate a major CHCA community event with a front-page picture. Should the mayor of Philadelphia arrive at said event, it makes sense to get him into the picture, too.
Mr. Katz, like Mayor Street, was invited to the gala. Mayor Street arrived bearing a surprise gift of mayor’s box tickets to an Eagles game — tickets that went at the auction for $500. Although Katz campaign staff members came to the party, Mr. Katz himself was not there. I am sure that his picture would have been front-page news, too, had he attended.
The CHCA takes no partisan position in the mayor’s race. It has, in fact, invited both candidates to come to speak to our community. An invitation, offered by CHCA president Maxine Dornemann, and signed by 9th Ward Republican Committeeperson Jesse Walters and 9th Ward Democratic Committeeperson Carol Cope (yes, me) was sent to each candidate in July.
Mayor Street has tentatively accepted our invitation and will join us at the Venetian Club on Sunday, October 19, at 6 p.m. So far the Katz campaign has been unable to accommodate us, but we will keep you posted.
One more thing: The Local used to refuse to publish anonymous letters. When did the policy change?

Carol Cope
Chestnut Hill
Ed note: Ms. Cope is correct about the Local’s policy regarding anonymous letters. Usually, we only withhold a writer’s name if their safety is a concern. In this case, the writer’s sister works at City Hall, and the siblings are often mistaken for each other.

Was it worth it?

In a recent letter to the Local (9-25-03) that could serve as a model of forensic dishonesty, upside down logic and internal inconsistency, Wyndmoor resident Andy Sharpe wonders whether Operation Iraqi Freedom was worth it. The answer to that query is so obviously “yes” that it would require prodigies of psychological excavation just to credit the legitimacy of the question.
Nevertheless, Sharpe concocts three convoluted and factually inaccurate “arguments” to conclude that it was not.

First, he claims that “the war in Iraq set us back decades, with casualties not seen since the Vietnam War.” Say what?! Fifty-eight thousand Americans were killed in action in Vietnam. More Americans died last week on the nation’s highways then were killed in Operations Desert Storm and Iraqi Freedom combined. If the 350 casualties that the United States has sustained during Iraqi Freedom render that campaign not worth our while, then World War II, wherein we sustained over 400,000 casualties, must surely qualify as the most foolhardy undertaking of all time.

Next, he dismisses the catastrophic potential of weapons of mass destruction in the hands of those who would do us harm by noting that the anthrax scare killed “less [sic] than ten people.” He failed to note, however, that the delivery system for this weapon of mass destruction, which emptied the Senate Office Building, closed a postal distribution center for months, evicted NBC News from its offices, undermined consumer confidence and set the already jittery investment community further on edge, cost less than fifty cents.

Finally, he claims that “if our attention and resources weren’t [sic] diverted to Iraq, our soldiers would have been able to thwart the [purported[ meeting of [high level al Qaeda operatives in Afghanistan] and possibly arrest some key terrorists.”

Notwithstanding that non sequitur, the fact is that our soldiers did capture six key al Qaeda operatives less than three weeks after the fall of Baghdad, including Whalid ba Attash, a top terrorist who ranked right below Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the September 11 attacks, who had been captured two months earlier while our attention and resources were diverted to a fruitless attempt to secure the backing of the gutless United Nations and its lackluster Secretary-General to enforce its own resolution.

In Operation Iraqi Freedom, the coalition forces defeated the world’s third largest standing army in three weeks, put the Butcher of Baghdad on the lam, terminated his two sociopath sons with extreme prejudice — though not extreme enough — gave religion to despots in North Korea, Syria and Liberia, sobered up Russia, and made the world safe for sensible Muslims — a virtual oxymoron — like King Abdullah and the Saudi royal family to speak out against radical Islam.

If, as Sharpe claims, “a growing number of Americans believe this war wasn’t worth it,” then this nation has far more serious problems than al Qaeda to worry about.

Joseph A. Ferry
Erdenheim