In his article on anti-Catholicism ("In the News,” September 2000), Kevin Baker finds it necessary to distance himself from the Catholic League’s criticisms of the Terrence McNally play Corpus Christi . He objects that my “vituperative attacks” were launched before the play even opened. There is a reason for this: The portions of the play that I read, along with statements by McNally, were quite disturbing. Besides, I find it impossible to believe that a play about Jesus having sex with the 12 apostles could be anything but offensive. If Baker disagrees, I’d love to hear his explanation.

Indeed, before Corpus Christi opened, I ran an op-ed-page ad in The New York Times imagining a play called “Shylock and Sambo” hitting Broadway. I asked people to consider how they might react if they learned of a play about to open that featured Jewish slave masters practicing sodomy on their obsequious black chattel. Would not blacks, Jews, gays, et al. be up in arms prior to having seen it? More relevant to my point now, would not even Baker object to such a play, sight unseen?

In short, it is not necessary to visit a sewer to know it stinks.