James F. Keating, an associate professor of theology at Providence College, wrote a wonderful piece at First Things that is worth a read.
As you likely know, I worked with The Cardinal Newman Society for many years and believe their mission to restore Catholic education is crucial. As a parent of five children, this is obviously on my mind quite a bit.
In short, I believe the answer to who killed the Catholic University, I’d say it was the cowardice of the bishops after Ex Corde Ecclesia. It sometimes seems they never fail to fail, do they?
Make no mistake they get a strong assist from the Jesuits as well. But the cowardice from the bishops sealed the fate of Catholic education in this country.
I remember when I was with The Cardinal Newman Society called around to local theology departments at large Catholic unversitites and asking if their theology professors has received the mandatum from the local bishop authorizing them to teach Catholicism.
I was literally laughed at by several theology chairs.
More than thirty years ago, John Paul II issued Ex Corde Ecclesiae, his apostolic constitution on Catholic universities. Although in some respects an updating of Vatican II’s Declaration on Christian Education, the all-but-forgotten Gravissimum Educationis, John Paul’s document was meant to inspire a renewal of authentic Catholic education in troubled times. He adopted what the late John O’Malley called Vatican II’s “invitational” style. Rather than denouncing abuses, the pope sought to invite, perhaps re-invite, Catholic professors and administrators to the adventure of Catholic higher education.
The adventure lies in sustaining an educational tradition that unites features of the intellectual life commonly thought antithetical: on the one hand, reason’s unencumbered search for truth; on the other, faith’s “certainty of already knowing the fount of truth,” the Son of God, the Logos of everything that exists. This adventure has an institutional aspect, as well. It unites the freedom proper to an institution of higher learning with the fact that any university worthy of the adjective “Catholic” derives its vitality from “the heart of the Church.”
By this phrase, John Paul reminds us of the historical fact that the very concept of the university arose in the Middle Ages, out of the Catholic conviction that faith and reason belong together. More importantly, he wished to make a substantive point: The education a Catholic university offers is informed by what the Church has learned from millennia spent in contemplation of the God of Jesus Christ. Catholic universities are “called to explore courageously the riches of Revelation and of nature so that the united endeavor of intelligence and faith will enable people to come to the full measure of their humanity, created in the image and likeness of God, renewed even more marvelously, after sin, in Christ, and called to shine forth in the light of the Spirit.” A Catholic university enables the local Church to pursue an “incomparably fertile dialogue” with the surrounding culture, one that touches on all aspects of human flourishing. It does so by producing students who bring to their professional lives and civic responsibilities a view of the whole of human life and the created order shaped by Christian faith. Moreover, John Paul continues, the scientific and humanistic research done within a truly Catholic university enhances the Church’s engagement with the wider society, allowing lay and clerical leaders to guide and influence governmental policies, economic arrangements, and new technologies so that they accord with what is truly good for human beings.
Ex Corde is a powerful document promulgated by a sainted pope. It should have excited and fortified every religious order, every bishop, every Catholic lay person entrusted with the leadership of a Catholic college or university. But it did not. To re-read it three decades after its promulgation is an experience more bitter than sweet. John Paul’s words fell on bad soil in America. By the time of the document’s release, Catholic higher education was surveilled by plucking birds, filled with stony rocks, and choked by suffocating weeds. There was little chance for Ex Corde to bear good fruit.
You can read the entire thing at First Things.
March 13, 2023 at 9:49 am
Working in a “Catholic” University, and for a practicing Catholic, is challenging. I work as a reference librarian, which adds layers to the situation. Working behind the scenes and purchasing solid Catholic theology and philosophy material is my way of helping maintain some ground. I pray daily while walking from the parking lot to the library that the University returns to its Catholic roots.
March 13, 2023 at 11:03 am
“In short, I believe the answer to who killed the Catholic University, I’d say it was the cowardice of the bishops after Ex Corde Ecclesia.” Or maybe after the Land O’ Lakes Statement. The cowardice has been on display for a LONG time.
March 13, 2023 at 3:36 pm
Yes, yes, John Paul Ii had the same vice of all the nerds that have ruled the Church after Vatican Ii. They think that writing a beautiful document solves any problem. They think that documents are magical incantations that allow them to set things right in the world.
Sorry to be rude, but less words and more actions. Less brain and more balls. I recently read a book about father Arrupe, the heretic superior of the Jesuits, and John Paul II. While Arrupe (and his ilk) was determined, smart and cunning, John Paul II was only taking action at the very last moment (when the evil was done) and the smallest action possible and the action was never sustained. He preferred to travel worldwide as a superstar instead of solving the infiltration taking place.
Do you want to solve the problem with Catholic universities? Start firing the bosses and recruiting new Deans and professors. No apology, no mercy against the servants of Satan. This is what they have done with us. Stop producing beautiful documents and do your job.
March 13, 2023 at 3:46 pm
Comment: I usually don’t comment anything about my private life but I think it is fitting in this topic.
About 3 months ago, I said in my secular university that the introduction of a program fomenting LGBTI was not a good idea. Only an opinion when opinions were asked. They fired me and I am unemployed.
This is how Catholic people should have acted when progressive infiltrators started saying progressive ideas in Catholic universities. We lacked balls and, as a result, progressives took over and now they rule Catholic universities.
But it feels good to play nice and be popular, like John Paul II. Jesus was so not nice when treating Pharisees and Temple traders
March 13, 2023 at 4:18 pm
Jesus gives us the model of how to act. Speak truth to power. Stand up for what is true at all times. Be steadfast, yet kind and charitable. For that you will be persecuted. So, thats what we are to do and that will be the response. Sucks if we want the rewards of the world….
March 13, 2023 at 4:30 pm
Agreed. Be charitable but not with the people that work in favor of evil when they do evil. Jesus was not charitable with the Pharisees.
In our days, be charitable is translated as be nice. We are the Church of Nice. While our enemies act with determination, we are afraid of not being charitable enough.
Sorry, charity is served when we fight evil. This is being charitable with everybody. Firing a heretic Dean is being charitable with students, with all the members of the Church that are protected from false doctrines, and even with the Dean, that is shown that he has chosen the wrong path, which gets him to damnation.
Charitable is not being nice. This image of Jesus being a tender hippie that tried not to hurt the feelings of evildoers is alien to the New Testament. Less beautiful writings and more actions
March 14, 2023 at 6:25 am
Douay-Rheims Bible
But I say to you, Love your enemies: do good to them that hate you: and pray for them that persecute and calumniate you:
March 14, 2023 at 8:37 am
You’re over the target, nobody.
You can hear the demons shrieking as Christ drives them over the cliff inside the swine.
Jesus was a direct speaker. We’ve had fifty years of self-serving pacifism masquerading as love and compassion. That generation will be known by the seeds they planted and the rotten fruits which we are harvesting today.
Love and charity have a cost. In your case it was a job. Some lose friendships and some social status. If our kindness has had no cost, then perhaps we were being kind to ourselves and not others. Take care.
March 19, 2023 at 5:14 pm
The Jesuits. It was their long term goal all along.