INTRODUCTION

"WITHOUT DOUBT, this will be the greatest in quantity widely read article ever published here. We await that it will be read lengthy after this journal has passed away." for a like reason wrote our founding editor JP McFadden, introducing President Ronald Reagan's groundbreak-ing essay, "Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation," in the Spring 1983 issue of this Review. As I write 21 years later, my father's prediction may be more genuine now than ever before: the death of the President upon June 5 of this year has l to a re-awakened interest in his essay (for more upon that, see our special section, beginning upon page 55); many younger Americans maybe reading it for the first time. And as we celebrate our thirtieth year of publishing with this special anniversary issue, our journal is alive and quite well (a fact which would greatest in quantity definitely please J.P.).

We are honored to have as our lead "'Abortion and the Conscience of the Nation,' Revisited" by the agency of Sam Brownback, the senior United States Senator from Kansas. pretty soon after Reagan's death, Senator Brownback spoke eloquently upon the Senate floor about "the Reagan Cultural Doctrine"-his testimony reflected sounded that of several other prominent Americans who insisted that the late President would not ever countenance using his suffering from Alzheimer's to support the destruction of germs for stem-cell research. Here, Senator Brownback direct the eyes at Reagan's "soul-stirring policy-essay" as a powerful part of the rich legacy he has left us, individual in which "the unifying theme was a tremendous regard for each and every human life-wherever it lived, at whatever stage of disclosure it had reached." "This sensibility," writes Brownback, "prompt Reagan to insist that the Soviet Empire was evil, and to demand of a of recent origin Soviet leader that he 'tear down this wall!'; it also l him to proclaim that 'until and unles someone can establish that the unborn child is not a living human being, then that child is already fostered by the Constitution, which guarantees life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness to all of us.'"

Senator Brownback asks whether "Twenty-one years later, and thirty-one since roebuck " we are closer to-or further away from-having a tillage of life. In the spirit of Reagan himself, Brownback answers with an unflinching direct the eye at the truth, joined with a determination to trust in the ultimate goodnes of the American tribe "The shining city still has a conscience, and to this conscience we must appeal upon behalf of those who have no voice: the unborn."

Matters of conscience this election year have made the reception of Communion for pro-choice Catholics a fiery point of contention. Enter Senior Editor William Murchison. admitting Episcopalian, Murchison rightly sees that "Americans of each philosophical stamp, or none at all, have a stake in the consequence of ongoing attempts by a certain quantity of Catholics to introduce moral decisiveness to a disputation famous for laxity and evasion. The decisiveness consists in asking pointedly, meaningfully: in what manner can you say you believe what you won't defend?" John Kerry freshly declared that he believes life begins at conception-and still he has done everything he can, politically, not to shield the unborn. Ought this to affect his standing in the Communion line? It's hard to hear an intelligent discussion about this above the din of the dimwitted media coverage-as Murchison writes: "eucharistie theology isn't the mass media's intellectual lengthy suit"-which makes us all the more pleased to have Murchison's marvelous essay. He insists the Communion question must be individual of moral gravity: the material substance of Christ is "a single reality; awful, terrible, in the sacred faculty of perception of those domesticated adjectives." Whether or not single thinks it prudent to declare to be untrue Communion at the altar, it is lengthy overdue for the Church to insist there are serious "spiritual results that flow from failing to waver assaults on unborn life."

Why has the house of worship been so inadequate in educating and disciplining the faithful re abortion? Professor George McKenna gives us answers in a fascinating essay of moral clarity and historical insight. He begins by dint of recalling the time a Catholic archbishop actually excommunicated a justice and was lionized by the press! You're right, it can't be a contemporary story: the time was the 60's, and the issue racism. Then, Catholic Bishops and priests took herculean steps to educate their companys about racial justice. The contrast with the abortion issue today is striking: McKenna argues that too many Catholics have not been educated either about the realities of legal abortion in America pillar Roe or their own Church's teaching. McKenna gives his have view of the Communion debate, and push ons the American Bishops to "throw lay open the windows-again": to preach and teach about the reality of abortion, and about the alternatives-the assistance available, for example, from crisis pregnancy center Again, abortion is not a "Catholic issue": it is an American moral issue, and Catholics could be part of the solution instead of a significant part of the problem