A MESSAGE FROM ANNE RICE

August 8, 1996

From: Anne Rice
To: The Residents of New Orleans and of the Redemptorist Parish

Thank you, thank you, thank you - all of you who turned out in the hundreds at our August 1st book signing at St. Alphonsus Parish, which included Sister Helen Prejean, author of DEAD MAN WALKING.

Thank you for believing in our Parish, and believing that we can save our magnificent churches.

Thanks to all of you who came home to the old neighborhood.

Be assured that as a resident of this Parish, baptized in St. Alphonsus, I will continue, as a New Orleans citizen, to do everything I can to bring back the glory of our monuments and make our tourist visitors aware of our magnificent Catholic heritage.

Let me apologize to the Redemptorist Fathers and to the Sisters of Mercy for the vicious articles that have appeared in the Times Picayune and, on August 8th, the Wall Street Journal, about my purchase of the chapel on Third and Prytania Street.

Let us pray for the small, selfish, self-centered coterie of Garden District snobs who have done so much to hurt our churches, attending a little chapel as they let it fall to ruin, rather than taking responsibility for a great Parish that incudes not only their lily white neighborhood, but the St. Thomas Project and the Irish Channel as well.

It is tragic to read in the pages of a national newspaper that a woman will not allow her child to come to catechism at the little chapel any longer because it belongs to me.

To the best of my knowledge, the chapel is still under the authority of the Redemptorist fathers. The Blessed Sacrament resides in the chapel. Almighty God has a way of holding his own.

Again, my thanks to all of you who love New Orleans, those especially who love our church Parish and will work for its revitalization.

My thanks also to so many Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish readers of my books who have praised them and embraced them for their spirituality, as well as their entertainment value.

It saddens me that I must be the one to say that INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE was a book about a quest for salvation. MEMNOCH THE DEVIL was also such a book. And so is my recent best seller, SERVANT OF THE BONES. I am not ashamed that good and evil are my obsessions. I am not ashamed that the Catholic Church implanted in me an eternal desire to know what is good, and to strive to do it.

God love you. If you, too, are horrified by the distortions and unkindness spread by these Garden District elitists, please do give your support to the Redemptorist Fathers and the Sisters of Mercy.

Anne Rice
1239 First Street
New Orleans, Louisiana 70130

Sincerely,
ANNE RICE

This is a personal note from Anne Rice. It is not copyrighted and can be reprinted and quoted by anyone, however, please do not distort the contents.

- From the New Orleans Times-Picayune, August 11, 1996.

To see Christopher Rice's response to the Wall Street Journal article, click here: "New Orleans Needs My 'Weird' Mother"