Quotable & Notable

“When I saw Hunter kneeling down to pray in his bedroom, I was convinced that now was the time.”

-- Patsy Okes, who is in the catechumate at St. Thomas the Apostle Parish, Sheffield Lake, Ohio, explaining how the example of her 7-year-old son Hunter inspired her to join the church

“We welcome this invitation to reflection and to dialogue.”

-- Cardinal Marc Ouellet of Quebec announcing at a news conference that Canadian bishops will meet with the 19 priests who published a letter of dissent from recent church documents on homosexuality last month

“I don’t work much during March Madness.”

-- Alex Bitz, 24, a computer engineer quoted by the Denver Post. Challenger, Gray & Christmas, an employment research firm, estimates the NCAA basketball tournament will cost businesses $3.8 billion in lost productivity.

“In death as in life, [Slobodan] Milosevic deprives millions of justice.”

-- Wesley Clark, former NATO commander and 2004 Democratic presidential candidate, writing in The Wall Street Journal

“I think the church’s job in politics is to make all of us feel guilty about something.”

-- Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne at a Boston College forum on politics, faith and public policy. In the last election, he said, “the church did not seem to be an equal opportunity guilt-producer.”

National Catholic Reporter, March 24, 2006