As one of her fellow "unashamed Tractarians," my reaction to Mary Therese Scott-Hamblen's article [TLC, Oct. 21] was relief that at last someone had the courage to say it out loud.

I participated in a diocesan function a few years ago where I addressed male members of the clergy as "Father." At its conclusion I was blindsided by a male priest. He approached me from behind and began browbeating me before I could even see him. I stammered that I use the term "Father" as a show of respect for the priest and for holy orders, and his vitriolic reply was that it was an insult. An insult to him and an insult to all priests. He demanded to know how I would have addressed female clergy, had any been present. Though I attempted to reply that I would call them "Mother," the question was entirely rhetorical, as he was wholly uninterested in an answer.

It was his uninhibited confidence that he could approach me, whom he had never before met, in a manner completely devoid of kindness, gentleness, or tolerance that made it abundantly clear that as an Anglo-Catholic I am a member of a despised and powerless minority. There is as much prejudice and bigotry in the Episcopal Church today as ever there has been in its history. It is only the groups against whom it is fashionable to direct such hostility that change from time to time.

Robert C. Clawson

Irmo, S.C.