Hi,

I just read an excerpt from Close-ups of Charismatics by John Vennari. I think his book is silly. He has no idea what or who Catholic Charismatics are. He should visit some of the communities all over the U.S. They are not trying to separate themselves from the Catholic Church, in fact all Catholic Charismatics that I know and there are many, are ready to die for their faith in Jesus, which they found in a deeper way since being baptized in the Holy Spirit. They are true to their Church, pope, priests, nuns and anyone in authority in the Church.

I only pray someday he will ask God to come into his heart and change his heart from stone to flesh to serve the God who created him and died for him and who can enlighten him.

Thanks, and you might take his book off your list, I would never buy it.

     M.L.J.



TIA responds:

M.L.J.,

To write his excellent work, Mr. John Vennari went to several conferences of Charismatics where they gave public testemony on what they really are. At each such conferences, he recorded many of their meetings, took numerous photos, and gathered their literature; he carefully studied all this material and compared it with the documents of the Catholic Magisterium. Then, he made his conclusions known to the public in a book of 175 pages. In short, he made a very serious work before presenting his conclusions.

On the contrary, you "just read an excerpt" of his book, and based on this you condemn all his efforts without any more consideration. Further, armed with this quite insufficient knowledge you went on to make personal attacks. Where is your Catholic sense of justice?

If you are one of those who have been "baptized in the Holy Spirit," should we consider your attitude a sample of the entire Charismatic movement? In this case, a question arises: Does this Spirit teach you to be fair to your neighbor? If the answer is yes, then why didn't you exercise such fairness with regard to Mr. Vennari and his work? If the answer is no, then who is this 'Spirit'?

Certainly you have the right to disagree with the author. But, please, do so in a serious way. With your rash critique, you incur your own condemnation: you don't know the work you pretend to judge.

     Cordially,

     TIA correspondence desk

Hi,

I am curious about your book on the Charismatic movement [Close-ups of the Charismatic Movement].

Some time ago, I lived in NJ. There was a priest named Fr. James Ferry. He ran a group called "The People of Hope." He was able to fill Giants Stadium with all the people in the group. My parents knew him. Yet, he also died under very strange circumstances. He had some sort of breakdown. Do you know any more about this?

Also he had a group who commandeered a parish called St Theresa (Little Flower) in Berkeley Heights. The bishop got involved, had to evict people, etc. There was also a nearby parish called St. Thomas More in Convent Station, which had a similar "community" - similar problems. Did you do any research on this? Do you know the whole story?

I know that many of the people in these groups ended in a bad way: breakdowns, mental illness.

     Thanks,

     M.S.



TIA responds:

M.S.,

Thank you for information, we didn't know it. We are passing it to our readers who may know more details.

TIA does not have a specialized research on the Charismatic movement. Members of our team have read some books on it and gone to some Charismatic events, but we have not written a book on the topic. On this subject we support the position of John Vennari in his work Close-ups of the Charismatic Movement, published by TIA in 2002.

We also have posted some photos on the WYDs and commentaries, which would seem to apply also to the Charismatic movement. We post them below for your perusal.

     Cordially,

     TIA correspondence desk

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