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This Insights eNewsletter was sent to subscribers on April 9, 2013.

eNewsletter Subject: The Church: Better to Be Simple and Direct

In a way, what we've been advocating when speaking of authentic Catholic renewal is a Church that is simple and direct. A Church that is clear about what it believes and what it expects of its members. A Church which bears frank and honest witness to the world. And a Church which simply and directly translates Faith into action. And this, of course, means us.

It looks like Pope Francis possesses something of this simplicity and directness. Consider our news summary of his homily for April 5th: Salvation only in Jesus, not in fortune tellers, tarot cards.

And a kind of direct simplicity is growing elsewhere in the Church as well. Thus Archbishop Allen Vignery of Detroit has just announced that Catholic politicians who advocate same-sex marriage should not receive Communion. (Public advocacy of grave evils has always been a disqualifier for Communion, but over the past generation or so, few bishops have been simple and direct about it.)

There is also an impressive simplicity and directness in Phil Lawler's favorite proposal for reforming the Curia: Break up the Vatican Secretariat of State....

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