That's not a trick question. It's at the center of a debate now swirling in California.
From the San Diego Union-Tribune:
There's much more at the link.A University of San Diego decision rescinding a prestigious position to a Catholic feminist theologian has thrust it smack in the middle of a national debate over academic freedom versus adherence to church teachings.
Faculty and Roman Catholics are divided over USD's decision to withdraw the appointment of Rosemary Radford Ruether to an endowed chair. At issue is Ruether's position on the board of directors for Catholics for Choice, an abortion rights organization.
Two national women's religious groups have sponsored a petition with more than 2,000 signatures demanding that she be allowed to assume the post.
USD is standing by its decision.
“Her public position and the symbol of this chair are in direct conflict,” said USD spokeswoman Pamela Gray Payton. “This chair is a powerful, visible symbol of Roman Catholic theology, and in Roman Catholic theology abortion is disallowed.”
The flap underscores a long-standing issue for American Catholic colleges: the debate over academic freedom versus fealty to Catholic doctrine. Many notable universities have come under fire for actions that clash with Catholic orthodoxy, including Notre Dame, Georgetown and St. Louis.
Ruether, 71, is concerned about the decision's effect on academic freedom.
“It appears to me that some right-wing group has put pressure on the university,” she said.
The position, the Monsignor John R. Portman Chair in Roman Catholic Theology, involved coming to campus three days a week, teaching a course, giving a public lecture, and mentoring junior faculty during the fall 2009 semester, said Lance Nelson, chairman of the Department of Theology and Religious Studies.
Nelson began negotiating with Ruether early this year after a list of possible candidates including Ruether was recommended in a department vote and approved by the previous dean of the College of Arts and Sciences.
“She's a widely respected scholar in the field,” Nelson said. “She's done seminal work on Christian feminism, social justice, and the relationship between religion and ecology.”
Ruether writes a regular column for National Catholic Reporter, has 13 honorary doctorates and has written more than 40 books. She teaches part time at Claremont Graduate University, about 40 miles east of Los Angeles.
After Ruether was offered the USD appointment, the university's Web site characterized her as a “pioneering figure in Christian feminist theology.”
The problem is that the appointment should have gone to the provost for final approval, Gray Payton said. That did not happen.
USD received various complaints about the appointment, though not from the chair's anonymous donor, Gray Payton said.
LifeSiteNews.com, founded by a Canadian anti-abortion organization, wrote a scathing article after the appointment was made.
“This is a woman who is in favor of abortion, in favor of contraception, homosexuality and women priests,” editor John-Henry Westen said in an interview. “I mean how much more anti-Catholic can you get?”
Nelson said the Department of Theology and Religious Studies was unaware of Ruether's role with Catholics for Choice, but he doesn't know if that knowledge would have changed the faculty's recommendation.
In mid-July, USD Vice President and Provost Julie Sullivan called Ruether to withdraw the offer.
Fifty USD faculty members have signed the petition demanding that USD reverse course. The petition was sponsored by the Women's Ordination Conference, which advocates for female priests, deacons and bishops; and the Women's Alliance for Theology, Ethics and Ritual, a multireligious feminist educational center with Catholic co-founders.
The petition asks for USD either to apologize and honor the offer or allow Ruether to deliver a campus lecture on academic freedom.
“Rosemary Ruether is like the godmother of the feminist theologian movement,” said Linda Pieczynski, spokeswoman and past president of Call to Action, a nonprofit Catholic organization that advocates on church reform issues and is endorsing the petition. “It's just criminal to disinvite her from the University of San Diego.”
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19 comments:
I'm afraid I just don't get the controversy here. I'm not a Catholic, but if there's a chair in Roman Catholic theology, doesn't that require that the person in that post actually believe what the Church teaches?
Darren...
You'd think so, wouldn't you? Would this even be an issue at, say, at Jewish university? Wouldn't they require that the teacher be in accord with Jewish teaching?
Dcn. G.
Was it not clear to the people involved that the the university was Catholic? This is by no means an isolated incident. That seemingly otherwise intelligent people continue to willfully ignore the "Catholic" modifier in front of the word university is laughable.
I also do not buy the academic freedom argument. They twist it to mean that as a faculty memeber, you can believe anything. No one would be crying academic freedom if this had happened to an astronomer professor who was head of the Flat Earth Society. The earth is simply not flat and anyone who believes this cannot be considered a true astronomer. We know that abortion is the killing of an innocent human being and cannot be justified. Anyone who sincerely believes otherwise cannot be considered a true Catholic theologian. This issue is not one of academic freedom, but academic HONESTY on the part of Ms. Ruether.
If Ms. Ruether did not respresent herself as being Catholic, then an academic freedom argument might apply. Then again, I don't believe USD ever represented itself as believing that all moral viewpoints are of equal merit nor are they equally valued. To some, this may sound contrary to the idea of a university, but again, only if you chose to ignore the Catholic modifier.
it was not long ago a Catholic professor was let go from Wheaton College in Wheaton, Il because he WAS Catholic, presenting a conflict with that college
I am in full agreement with the USD decision to remove her. When will people understand that being Catholic is not based on individual's points of view on items from the Magisterium. This is not a cafeteria where you can pick and choose what you want to believe and teach.
As a Catholic teacher, you should take a similar oath that a deacon does when he receives the book of the Gospel - Believe what you read, "teach" what you believe, and practice what you "teach." Otherwise, find a job at the local secular university.
Academic freedom in not license. As Pope Benedict said to the educators when he was in the U.S.
"In regard to faculty members at Catholic colleges universities, I wish to reaffirm the great value of academic freedom. In virtue of this freedom you are called to search for the truth wherever careful analysis of evidence leads you.Yet it is also the case that any appeal to the principle of academic freedom in order to justify positions that contradict the faith and the teaching of the Church would obstruct or even betray the university's identity and mission; a mission at the heart of the Church's munus docendi and not somehow autonomous or independent of it. "
Ok, explain how this quote;
"It appears to me that some right-wing group has put pressure on the university,” she said"
differs from this one;
"Two national women's religious groups have sponsored a petition with more than 2,000 signatures demanding that she be allowed to assume the post."
Am I to believe that 2,000 signatures on a petition is not "pressure" ???
best to always remember to remove the plank from your own eye first...
I'm a student at a Catholic University, and I am appauled and saddened by the theology department where I attend. At one point we had an Anglican/Buddhist women priest as the head of the theology department. The effects of her less than orthodox theology are still lingering. It is mandatory by default that incoming students take liberation theology as their core requirement. You cannot even take an intro to Catholicism until Junior year, and by then only those in that major would need it. Sad.
Archbishop Fulton Sheen warned that if you want your children to lose their faith send them to a "Catholic" college. What a disgrace that she was ever even considered for this post. Time to remove the 50 sympathetic faculty who would rather have her than the Truth.
One of the things this all says to me is THE CATHOLIC CHURCH HAS THE FULL TRUTH. As Dcn. Greg pointed out, try this in a Jewish school? Who would dare, or even more, even WANT to.
The CC is the fullest "light", and in these trying times in the age of moral relativism, the last thing the culture wants is "the shining light." The best defense against it of course, is to "attack from within."
Hopefully SDU will stick to it's guns, and not be overwhelmed by "pressure." After all, if this is "pressue", God help all of us in what's to come.
All that said, for anyone who has never been on the campus of SDU, IMO, it is the most beautiful campus in America, only made more perfect by the gently breeze of the Pacific it overlooks. Who wouldn't want to work there?
Why does the left routinely act like it's OBNOXIOUS for the church to actually expect its theologians and professors to uphold its teachings? The left loves lockstep conformity to its own political dogmas, but let any church ask its members to conform, and they're "right wing haters" and "zealots."
I'm getting sick of these people.
"Nelson said the Department of Theology and Religious Studies was unaware of Ruether's role with Catholics for Choice"
I find this hard to believe. Every semester, the first thing I do at the begining of our formation classes is to google the name of the professors and the authors of the assigned textbooks.
As for "academic freedom", the Catholic Church has the Truth. If you are truly a Catholic, why bring that which will take you away from it?
Uh, would she have been applying for a mandatum?
I mean, you'd think she would be asked to.
Then what would have happened?
I'm totally backing the USD administration on this one and wondering what the heck their theology dept was thinking. She has done some important scholarly work but she is Catholic in name only.
It's pretty simple: people often confuse the concepts of rights and privileges in the same manner that they confuse rights with responsibility. I would not want to send my money and child to a Catholic institution where the instructor's personal beliefs are suspect. I expect a Catholic education to be just that - Catholic.
If the professor taught what the church teaches, but does things on her own time, off the clock, is that a problem?
And is she teaching about abortion or choice for abortions? Likely her teaching is within the realm of Catholic thought?
Where does one's professional life end and personal life begin?
"Do as I say and not as I do" is not a good philosophy for any public figure, go ask any number of political figures who have had to publicly apologize for personal mistakes that ran counter to their public work i.e. the former New York State Governor Eliot Spitzer. He publicly fought against prostitution while he, in his private life, visited prostitutes.
Look how far it got him.
Likewise, as a military officer, I can't have it both ways either. I can't tell my people to not drink and drive and then go out and do it myself. (For arguments sake, because of the UCMJ, I have a right/responsibility to get into areas such as this with my people) I would be relieved for cause, sent packing, and lose all credibility with seniors, peers and subordinates alike. I am a very public figure and don't get to differentiate between public and personal - leadership is 24 hours a day. If I don't like it I always have the option of leaving.
Like it or not, public figures are role models and Rosemary Ruether is just that. In her position she has the ability to influence others by both her words and her actions. USD recognizes this and therefore wants role models who both talk the talk AND walk the walk.
Women's Ordination Conference sponsored the petition? The blind promoting the blind and trying to blind everyone else as well.
There's a fairly detailed analysis and documentation of Ms. Reuther's beliefs and writings at this link.
Dcn. G.
Where can I start a list of names of all those who want to send a letter to the University congratulating them on their descison?
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