[sent this letter this morning]
re: “Notre Dame Professor McInerny said: Notre Dame has forfeited its right to call itself a Catholic university.” link | pdf
Dear Father Jenkins,
I agree with Professor McInerny. I have watched Notre Dame become less Catholic over time in pursuit of a goal to join the ranks of liberal, secular ivy league schools. The student parking lots have filled with BMWs. The dining halls would be the envy of Caligula. Everything has gone materially upscale in the pursuit of prestige.
In 2001, my oldest daughter was awarded early acceptance to Notre Dame. To my surprise, she decided to *not* pursue the material path that she saw there. She is now serving in the Peace Corps, and I’ve never been more proud of her. (I hope parental pride is not a deadly sin.) Since then many priests have cautioned me that Notre Dame is no place to send our children for a Catholic education. Are you aware of that sentiment?
The commencement invitation is a last straw for me.
Is it possible to have all records of my attendance at Notre Dame purged or hidden? Can all mailing records be erased or set to “do not mail”? For the next four (I hope not eight) years, I would like to disassociate myself from the university. I am actively changing my resume, LinkedIn, Facebook , etc. to read “University of N—- D—“.
Jeb Cashin
Class of 1983 (in exile)
Or…
You’re upset because Notre Dame invited the President of the United States to give a commencement address?
Maybe people who don’t support that should no longer be able to call themselves Americans. He is their elected leader.
Maybe people who imply Americans can’t express their views about a president they did not vote for should move to China. And maybe they should give their car to their niece before they leave. Maybe.
He’s your president too. I would never have even thought that it would be anything but an honor for my university to host a sitting president, even if it was George Bush or Ronald Reagan. What you are doing is being intolerant of other viewpoints and disrespecting the leader that was elected by this country. And to add to that you take the pettiness to another level by attempting to dictate to your alma mater who they should and should not associate with. Notre Dame has a history of having presidents speak at their commencements and any college would feel honored to get to keep that streak going. Vanderbilt, a conservative school that ranks about equally with Notre Dame in the bottom of the US News Top 25, was only able to get Laura Bush in 2006.
If you read my letter you’ll see that the Obama invite is just a straw in my growing frustration with a university that claims to be Catholic but continues to act otherwise.
Bishop D’Arcy has attended the ND commencement all 24 years of his tenure. He isn’t going this year “in defense of the truth about human life.”
Professor McInerny’s protest is that Notre Dame is “choosing prestige over truth.” This isn’t the first time.
97% of ND seniors writing to the campus paper support the invite, even higher than the overall 73% of the student body that supports the invite. In contrast, only 30% of alumni writing are for the invite with 70% against. The high 97% drives home my concern that Notre Dame is not a place for a Catholic education. There should be more division here. The seniors are seduced by prestige over truth.
So Obama is just a straw. This is a theological, not political topic, and to quote Obama, “I don’t presume to be able to answer these kinds of theological questions.” Such questions are above his pay grade. pdf
re: “I would never have even thought that it would be anything but an honor for my university to host a sitting president”
1974 commencement (if not 1973.) Nixon.
And if there had been a commencement on August 18th, 1998, hosting a seated president may have felt a bit awkward. | pdf
Now, boys, remember you are brothers.
Love,
Mom
The stage will have another empty chair. Newsweek link. | pdf
I must confess, he really made a great speech. Sure can work a crowd. Still, I would have liked to have been sitting in cap and gown in protest at the Grotto… with an iPhone… watching the speech stream live. [pdf]