PULPIT POLITICS.

Comments on the Catholic Church's use of the pulpit and pastoral letters to create awareness for its positions on various social and political issues in the U.S. Background on the Church's social doctrine; Attention stirred by the bishops' draft pastoral letter on nuclear war; Institutional changes that have thrust politics into the center of Catholic life; Growth of the Church's institutional resources devoted to the concerns of social justice; Redirection of religious energy into the secular realm, particularly on the part of the clergy; Rise in the number of clerics and Church officials that are professionally involved in Church-sponsored social activism.