Today is the day that the administration's chief Obamacare enforcer Kathleen Sebelius, the seemingly Catholic-in-name-only (CINO) US Secretary of Health and Human Services, addresses Georgetown University graduates at their commencement exercises. Here is an interesting development... Both the following article and William Oddie's commentary which follows pose the very same obvious questions that have been bothering me about the inaction of the US bishops about CINO universities who continue to call themselves Catholic...
'Exorcist' author and other concerned alumni
organize to contest right of Georgetown U
to continue calling itself Catholic
Washington, D.C., May 18 – Academy Award winner William Peter Blatty, whose best-selling book and blockbuster film
The Exorcist were situated at his alma mater, Georgetown University, announced today that he will lead alumni, students and other members of the new Father King Society to petition the Catholic Church for remedies up to and including the possible removal or suspension of top-ranked Georgetown’s right to call itself Catholic or Jesuit in its fundraising and representations to applicants.
The move comes on the heels of an unprecedented rebuke of Georgetown and its first lay president by His Eminence, Donald Cardinal Wuerl, the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Washington, over Georgetown’s invitation to HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to be a diploma ceremony speaker today. Georgetown, however, has not backed down.
The editors of the Archdiocesan newspaper wrote in an editorial last Sunday regarding Georgetown: “When the vision guiding university choices does not clearly reflect the light of the Gospel and authentic Catholic teaching, there are, of course, disappointing results.”
The Father Kings Society’s Canon Law action, based on
Georgetown’s failure for more than two decades to comply with the requirements of Ex corde Ecclesiae (ECE), the 1990 Apostolic Constitution for Catholic Universities, was already being planned before the Sebelius scandal.
“This is simply the last straw,” said Blatty. “The scandals that Georgetown has given to the faithful are too many to count, and too many to ignore any longer.”
On the Father King Society website [www.fatherkingsociety.org ] announcing the Canon Law action, Blatty writes: “Of course, what we truly seek is for Georgetown to have the vision and courage to be Catholic, but clearly the slow pastoral approach has not worked. …Georgetown is being dishonest. Together, we need to end that!”
Linking GU’s non-compliance with Church law to GU’s regular scandals, the website tracks the Archdiocesan editorial: “Twenty two years of GU scandals, since
Ex corde Ecclesiae was promulgated, are not just proof of a failed Catholic identity, they are evidence and a direct result of Georgetown’s failure to comply with ECE.”
Blatty does not mince words about who is to blame for Georgetown’s slide:“Many believe that to make Georgetown truly Catholic is to turn back the clock hands and somehow limit its very nature as a university, as if the notion of ‘Catholic’ and ‘university’ are new to each other, or inherently at odds. On the contrary, to make Georgetown ‘Catholic’ is to move the clock forward; it is to make the University better than it now is! Of course, there are always those who are afraid of change — who lack vision. They may need to step aside.”
“John Paul II exhorted us all to preserve for the Church the highest places of culture — our universities. Generations of alumni have long been seduced to ‘go along’ by dinners, medals, and board seats. We have all been negligent for too long: the laity, the clergy, and the bishops as well.”
The Fr. King Society has enlisted the help of The Cardinal Newman Society, which for nearly two decades has been a leader in the movement to promote strong Catholic identity. The Cardinal Newman Society will provide expert advice, research assistance, and public relations support.
In 1991-1992, Georgetown was the stage for a similar Canon Law action based on
Ex corde Ecclesiae. Then-Dean of Student Affairs Dr. John J. DeGioia, now GU’s first lay president, authorized funding and support for a pro-abortion student advocacy group. Cardinal James Hickey rebuked Georgetown but held that the matter needed resolution in Rome, and the petitioners appealed directly to John Paul II. Georgetown’s Jesuit president was called to Rome.
A few weeks later on a Friday afternoon, the support for the pro-abortion student group was reversed, and the Canon petition became moot. It was a success that reverberated as other universities announced defunding of similar clubs.
The new planned Canon Law action is larger in scale and potential consequences than the 1991-1992 petition. The United States Catholic Bishops are presently evaluating the implementation of
Ex corde Ecclesiae two decades later, and on May 5th His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI urged American bishops expressly to implement the constitution in the United States.
NB: Father King is Thomas King (1929-2009), who was a professor of theology at Georgetown U. In 1999, The Hoya, Georgetown's student newspaper, declared King "Georgetown's Man of the Century", noting that "no one has had a more significant presence on campus and effect on students than Father King." He wrote many books on Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, the controversial Jesuit archeologist-philosopher, but firmly stood for very orthodox positions.
Here we go again: another supposedly ‘Catholic’
US university honours a prominent anti-Catholic
But why are we all so surprised? And why are secularised institutions
still allowed by the Church to describe themselves as ‘Catholic’?
By William Oddie
Friday, 18 May 2012
I begin with an editorial, headlined “Disappointed but not surprised”, published in
The Catholic Standard, the newspaper of the Catholic Archdiocese of Washington. This says most of what needs to be said, both about the invitation by Georgetown University (a supposedly Catholic institution) to the supposedly Catholic US Secretary for Health Kathleen Sebelius (who promotes abortion) to speak there, and also about Georgetown University itself:
Late last Friday, Georgetown University announced that US Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius is the featured speaker for an awards ceremony at the University’s Public Policy Institute. This news is a disappointment but not a surprise.
As is well known, Secretary Sebelius is the architect of the “HHS mandate”, now federal law, which requires all employers – including religious institutions – to provide health insurance coverage of abortion-inducing drugs, sterilisation and contraceptives for its employees and redefines religious ministry to exclude Catholic social services, hospitals and universities if they serve or employ non-Catholics. Given her position, it is disappointing that she would be the person that Georgetown University would choose to honor.
Founded in 1789 by John Carroll, a Jesuit priest, Georgetown University has, historically speaking, religious roots. So, too, do Harvard, Princeton and Brown. Over time, though, as has happened with these Ivy League institutions, Georgetown has undergone a secularisation.
This, says the Standard, is “due in no small part to the fact that Many are quite clear that they reflect the values of the secular culture of our age. Thus the selection of Secretary Sebelius for special recognition, while disappointing, is not surprising”.
This seems both reasonable and realistic. It says, almost, well, Georgetown University used to be Catholic and now isn’t: what do you expect? So why are US Catholics making such a fuss about this invitation?
After all, to take an example for me closer at hand, Oxford used to be a Catholic university. Then it became an Anglican university (to receive a degree you had to accept the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion). Today it’s an entirely secular university (which makes it possible for Catholics to attend it once more), though it has a theology department, many senior teaching positions in which are reserved for Anglicans.
But the university operates in an entirely secular way: nobody asks whether those it honours support abortion or execrate religion: some do, some don’t. Catholic members of the University like me take this for granted: it would be nice if it were otherwise, but it’s not. So why don’t US Catholics similarly accept that Georgetown has just changed? It happens.
Well, there’s a very good answer to that question: it’s that in its own official description of itself, it still is a Catholic institution and hasn’t changed at all. Being Catholic, and Jesuit, is part of its sales pitch. So perhaps the Catholic Standard is wrong to be so fatalistic. Have a look at Georgetown’s website if you doubt me:
Established in 1789, Georgetown is the nation’s oldest Catholic and Jesuit university. Drawing upon this legacy, we provide students with a world-class learning experience focused on educating the whole person through exposure to different faiths, cultures and beliefs. With our Jesuit values and location in Washington, DC, Georgetown offers students a distinct opportunity to learn, experience and understand more about the world.
So what exactly are Jesuit values these days, we ask ourselves. What does Georgetown think they are? I ask not to invite the horse-laugh some of you are no doubt already emitting, but with the intention of posing a serious question.
Here’s another question: if Georgetown University really has “undergone a secularisation”, why is it still calling itself Catholic? More to the point,
why is the Archdiocese of Washington allowing it to call itself Catholic?
Georgetown is presumably describing itself as Catholic in order to attract Catholics as students, and perhaps deceitfully to allay the anxieties of their parents. If so,
its self-description is simply fraudulent. Is there no American equivalent of our Trade Descriptions Act? [But Georgetown is only one of many 'brand-name' CINO universities in the USA who have gone merrily thumbing their noses and flippantly baring their behinds at Catholic orthodoxy while the bishops do nothing. The public condemnation by more than 100 bishops - the US has more than 200 - of Notre Dame Unviversity when it invited openly pro-abortion President Barack Obama (someone I would call Christian-in-name-only, or even Christian-only-for-political expediency, since majority of Americans are still Christian) to be its commencement speaker in 2009 was unprecedented but alas, also a one-time hiccupt, it seems, because there is none of that now about Goergetown!]
The Archdiocese of Washington, according to the
New York Times, released a strong letter of rebuke to Georgetown’s president on Tuesday afternoon, calling Ms Sebelius the architect of the birth control mandate — “the most direct challenge to religious liberty in recent history”. But if even the archdiocese’s own newspaper accepts that it is now a secular university, why bother?
[They must at least 'bother', be it simply in a token manner, as the Archdiocesan 'rebuke' appears to be, or be even more derelict in their Catholic duty.]
The conflict, as the
New York Times reminds us, is only the latest example of friction between Catholic universities and their local bishops, who, as it says “are charged with ensuring that the universities uphold Catholic doctrine and exhibit an explicitly Catholic identity”.
[Friction? No! Friction is two surfaces rubbing against each other, but in this case, the rubbing against has been virtually one-sided. Catholic academe defies repeatedly, and the ocal Catholic hierarchy simply play the dumb monkey who sees and hears nothing!]
But is this now a realistic expectation? I ask this as a genuine question. From this side of the great pond, I just don’t know, and solicit the informed opinion of any American reader who may be reading. This isn’t a problem we have here.
Is this a fight that can still be won? The Cardinal Newman Society of Virginia, which seems to be a rather admirable outfit, is dedicated to waging precisely this particular culture war. The
New York Times says it has “played an influential role as a whistle-blower, alerting bishops when they find a university stepping out of line” and informs us that “This spring, the group compiled a list of 12 Catholic universities with commencement speakers they found objectionable because of their support for abortion rights or gay rights.”
Its mission statement reads as follows:
Founded in 1993, the mission of The Cardinal Newman Society is to help renew and strengthen Catholic identity in Catholic higher education. The Society seeks to fulfill its mission by
- Assisting and supporting education that is faithful to the teaching and tradition of the Catholic Church;
- Producing and disseminating research and publications on developments and best practices in Catholic higher education;
- Advising students, alumni, trustees, campus officials, faculty and others engaged in renewing and strengthening the Catholic identity of Catholic colleges and universities and Church-affiliated ministries at non-Catholic colleges and universities; and
- Studying and promoting the work of our patron, John Henry Cardinal Newman, especially as it relates to Catholic higher education and the unity of faith and reason.
But can they possibly win? Have they, in fact, had any success in persuading the authorities of any officially Catholic university to “disinvite” a speaker with anti-Catholic beliefs it was intending to honour? Again, this is a real question: if they have been successful in this way, I’m at least partly wrong.
I am pessimistic about this. Not about the renewal of the Church herself: that is already happening. But in the case of universities like Georgetown, has not the whole process of secularisation gone too far?
Should not effectively secularised institutions be declared non-Catholic by the Church herself? [Clearly, papal admonition, even by formal decree, does not work. All these CINO universities have been among the most ostentatious in their praise of John Paul II, both when he was alive and afterwards. Yet all they did with his 1999 Ex Code Ecclesiae was to toss it into the wastebasket as soon as they received it! I hope some canon lawyer - like Dr. Ed Peters - writes about the recourses possible that a local bishop can take to withdraw the 'Catholic' cachet from the CINOs. This is a competency of the local bishop, not the Vatican. ]
The dangers of the present situation are obvious.
Every time a self-proclaimed Catholic university like Georgetown honours a Catholic apostate it promotes the notion that Catholics can believe what they like, for all the world as though they were Anglicans (there is or used to be an organisation for Anglican priests who don’t believe in the existence of God).
I end on an uncertain note. I have written this piece as much to gather information as to air my own anxieties. This is still, clearly, very much a live question in America. Why is that? Here, it was unhappily settled centuries ago.
[But how many Catholic universities are there in the UK compared to those in the USA?]
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 18/05/2012 21:10]