While I'm pleased to see that a majority of Catholics in the reported survey want sisters to speak out on vital issues, I'm also dismayed that there is so little apparent concern for the investigation that has resulted largely from sisters doing what the laity favor: speaking or acting out a justice based set of convictions. Those actions have incurred the wrath of the hierarchy which, in turn, has sent the investigators in motion.

Perhaps most Catholic lay people think the Vatican's probe into the affairs of nuns is child's play or simply a routine inspection that anyone in any organization should expect, like a yearly review by the boss.

It's not a harmless exercise or a polite review in my opinion. Sisters have been singled out because many of the biggest wigs in the church complain that too many nuns have been thinking for themselves and speaking their minds in concert with other sisters on a variety of justice issues inside and outside the church.

Maybe the laity simply haven't been paying attention to Rome's drive to "correct" the very thing the laity says it honors. I would hope that the many good lay people who see the sisters as bearers of Vatican II would also protest the treatment they are receiving from Rome. Those who value the sisters' prophetic voice should be willing to come to their aid when such prophesy gets them into trouble.