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Word Gems 

exploring self-realization, sacred personhood, and full humanity

 

Father Reginald Foster 

 

 

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Father Reginald Foster 

 

Biographical information from Wikipedia:

Father Reginald Foster O.C.D. is an American Catholic priest, an expert in Latin literature, especially Cicero. After spending more than 40 years in Rome, he returned to the U.S. in 2009. He suffers health complications resulting from a fall in 2008.

In 2008, outside the Vatican, Father Foster was interviewed by Bill Maher in the documentary-film Religulous. 

Father Foster comments on several Church teachings, among them, the doctrine of Hell, which, he says, is "stupid," a fairy-tale of the Middle Ages.

CLICK HERE to view a Youtube excerpt of the interview.

 

 

Two things immediately struck me about Father Foster as I watched the Maher-interview:

(1) He is extremely affable, congenial, a true human being, not unlike my near-relative, Father John Kuhn.

(2) Father Foster is no politician, speaks the truth plainly, and sounds very much like Father Robert Hugh Benson.

There is little doubt in my mind that, during my troubled teen-years, a time of confrontation with the Church, had I been counseled by a humanistic spirit of a Father Foster, I would not have separated myself from the Church, but would have worked within the system, as did Reginald and John, to effect change and to promote the truth.

Whether staying would have been the right decision, however, is another issue.

 

 

 

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