April 12, 2009
Degrees of arrogance
Easter Sunday and I get stirred up by Notre Dame? I should just ignore the bro-ha-ha over the invitation issued by the current president of Notre Dame (ND), the Rev. John Jenkins, to president Obama to speak at ND's graduation, but I'm drawn to the story like a moth to a flame. The New York Times op-ed piece is entitled "Degrees of Acceptance at Notre Dame," a school known more for football than scholarship. But, to steal a phrase from the Anti-Defamation League, "Some of my best friends (and one colleague)graduated from Notre Dame." It is a good school.
And in the Civil Rights battles in the 1960s, we had a friend and pillar of strength in then ND President, the Rev. Theodore Hessburgh. The author of the op-ed is Ronald Reagan's national security adviser, Richard Allen, who spells out how today's Church is anything but ecumenical. It is the Church of Opus dei and Pius XII not John XXIII. It is Bishop Morlino not a church dedicated to liberating the poor.
It is back to the days when non-believers like my mother and grandfather could hope for Limbo but never Heaven. Yikes! I thought those thoughts were buried long ago.
Imagine the chutzpah of ND alums, including, according to Allen, "priests, bishops, archbishops and cardinals" (What? No nuns?) demanding that ND withdraw the invitation to speak or, at least, says Allen, refuse to confer an honorary degree on the president, "because degrees honor something." (I did not make up that quote.) Are you kidding us, Mr. Allen? Do you think his presidency will be incomplete without a degree from the Gipper's school?
"Punish" Obama, the president of our country, because he believes that women have rights? Whoa Nelly! Blind arrogance. And the sun revolves around earth.
Happy Easter.
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