Dear All, When I arrived here fourteen years ago, I promised very little; only that whatever I was, for good or ill, I was yours’. Here is another promise. Shortly after the Fourth of July, I will no longer be yours.

Dear All, Obviously, I have been thinking about and writing about the relationship between a priest and his parishioners – or, better, the relationship between the ordained and baptized priests in a parish.

Dear All, If the priesthood of the Baptized is where the saving work of Christ for the world is really carried on, what is the meaning of an ordained/professional priesthood?

Dear All, After fourteen years as the only priest in this area -- the only fulltime religious professional in this area – and so, the only one whose life was expected to be wholly devoted to ‘the sacred’, ‘God’, ‘religion’, ‘parish’, I have come to have some very strong views on how totally wrong this is, how frustrating it is and how deadly it is for parish and church and the individual Christian.

Dear All, I have been thinking a lot about a statement by a theologian named Joseph Ratzinger. He said that societies and cultures early on developed a ‘priestly class’.