By James Martin
America Magazine
October 12, 2009
http://www.americamagazine.org/blog/entry.cfm?blog_id=2&id=73920266-3048-741E-2520824929771251
US Catholic is launching a survery of both women religious and other Catholics about the apostolic visitation of women religious.
The editors of the magazine wrote to us:
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Since there have been more questions than answers surrounding the visitation, we decided to ask Catholics what they thought were the reasons behind it and whether it was justified or not. We are happy to report that our survey of women religious has had a tremendous response, with more than 600 women filling it out in detail. Never did we imagine, though, that our reader survey, open to all website visitors, would receive the response that it has over the past few days. Since a priest posted a "poll alert" on his blog on Tuesday, we received more than 1,500 vote on our quick poll and nearly 500 entries to the reader survey. The results of our quick poll swung from 55 percent saying the apostolic visitation was "insulting and unjustified" to 83 percent saying it was "necessary." The conversation on the website has been heated and fascinating—with more than 130 comments on the quick poll, most from those who enthusiastically welcome the apostolic visitation. A few fierce defenders of women religious have tried to fight back, claiming at the beginning that conservatives had "attacked" the poll. The response to our survey reveals the passion Catholics on all sides feel about the apostolic visitation. As somebody interested in church news and issues, we thought you might be interested in this lively conversation going on at our website over this issue. We welcome all perspectives on our website, and we hope that you, too, might link to or share our survey. We hope that our results, which will be published in the January 2010 issue of U.S. Catholic, represent the widest swath of American Catholics as possible.
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