George Wiegel, who authored the book on which the program was based, reported only good things about the pope. He knew anything and everything the pope did was to benefit the church despite whether others benefitted or were hurt by the pope's actions.

Books could be written about the wrongs the pope did, much of it against the United States.. Although he faulted Catholic priests in Central America for being involved in politics, he in later years openly directed all clergy and parishioners to be politically active. He wants Catholic doctrine to be the law of our land and founded the Ave Maria School of Law to help bring that about. He directed American bishops to require all Catholic public office holders to support Catholic causes or be disciplined. He told all Catholics they must impose papal teaching on all non-Catholics even they needed to be martyrs to do so. Being willing to lose your life for Catholic causes is considered by the pope to be the highest level of Catholic commitment.

As Wiegel reported, the pope warned that capitalism in the USA with undisciplined morality will fail. He publicly said the USA was a worse threat to Roman Catholicism than atheistic communism ever was. The communist leaders in Poland urged promotions for him in the church as many of his economic polices were and still are the same as the communists. The pope openly counseled third world countries not to become like the USA. He declared the USA to be an immoral nation as it will not let everyone who wants to migrate to the USA to do so-the pope wants the borders of all nations, except the Vatican, to be open.

The pope also defined the USA as having a "culture of death" because of our laws legalizing abortions.. He captured Reagan and both Bush presidents to issue presidential directives and to pass laws limiting the use of US funds by the UN for family planning purposes and international treaties granting freedom to women. Bush's relations with Russia and China reflect the fact the pope is unhappy with these nations' treatment of Catholics.

No mention in the program was made about the civil wars in Yugoslavia and in East Timor triggered by the pope. With help from Bush, Sr., he successfully pushed to make Catholic dominated Slovenia and Croatia independent from Yugoslavia though the war ultimately resulted in the deaths of more than 500,000 Yugoslavians. He funded Catholic guerillas fighting Indonesia troops for more than 20 years. After the deaths of more than 200,000 Catholics and Muslims and, again, with the help of the USA, East Timor will be an independent Catholic nation.

Many of the pope's misdeeds rivaled the pluses reported. No mention was made of the crises about clergy abuse of children, youth and adults which the pope knew about for years. He asked whether many women who were raped didn't bring this on themselves. He has been told that priests who have sexually abused children and women told the victims they were doing what God wants them to do, and he publicly did nothing.. About abusive priests, the pope explained that the high level of education and training that priests receive far surpasses the education and training of many people so it's easy to understand why they may feel superior to many of their parishioners.

In Africa, priests pressured Mother Superiors of their orders to have their nuns have sex with them or they would have sex with the natives and may get venereal diseases or AIDS. The repeated pleas from the Mother Superiors to the Vatican and the pope to intervene were ignored. Some of the priests did impregnate some of the nuns and assisted them in getting abortions.

In Rwanda and Burundi, priests and nuns begged the Vatican to permit them to make birth control methods available to the people before overpopulation might help spark a civil war. The pope refused, civil war occurred, and more than a half million Rwandans and Burundis died. Despite proof that condoms reduced the incidents of AIDS, the pope refuses to approve the use of condoms in Africa to help bring the AIDS epidemic under control..

Much more of the public record of the pope needs to be publicized to give a truer portrayal of the kind of pope he is and was. Weigel knows the record but chose to overlook the data faulting the pope.

It's regrettable you used public television to tell a biased story about a religious leader and had staff members and volunteers loudly praising him.

Sincerely,

James M. O'Hara

NOT FOR PUBLICATION