Reading Gibson

For Tim Rutten to question Mel Gibson’s Catholicity is as invidious as it is laughable (“Critics Debate ‘The Passion,’ Gibson Evades the Debate,” Feb. 4). In a day and age when it is deemed inappropriate for anyone to question the Catholicity of Gray Davis or Teddy Kennedy, it is mind-boggling that a journalist thinks he has the right -- and the credentials -- to scrutinize Gibson.

In any event, all the ad hominem attacks in the world will not stop “The Passion of the Christ” from being a blockbuster hit. Thanks, in part, to people like Rutten.

William A. Donohue

New York

Donohue is president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights.

*

Rutten accuses Gibson of rejecting papal authority because he challenges some of the teachings of Vatican II. Many Catholics challenge certain Vatican II teachings, which can be done because they were not issued infallibly, but nobody other than Pope Rutten would say that they can no longer be Catholic.

Richard Shapiro

Baldwin Park