Trouble on the homefront: CUA & Georgetown (John Kerry Alert!)

American Papist ^ | September 13, 2007 | Thomas Peters

[NYer]

Two stories, sadly, taking place in my backyard.

First, John Kerry has been invited to speak at the Catholic University of America:

LifeSiteNews:

Pro-Abortion John Kerry to Speak at Catholic University of America: Invitation violates principle unanimously agreed upon by US Bishops in 2004

WASHINGTON, September 10, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Catholic University of America (CUA) has invited former presidential candidate, Senator John Kerry to speak on environmentalism and the Iraq war this semester, despite initial opposition by the office of University Center, Student Programs and Events (UCSPE).

The Tower, the campus paper of Catholic University, said the UCSPE had initially objected to Kerry's appearance, saying there is an "unwritten" campus rule banning political candidates during an election year.

Kerry, who still receives Communion regularly, has a 100 per cent pro-abortion voting record according to NARAL Pro-Choice America. During the 2004 presidential debates, Kerry claimed that he was "personally against abortion", but would not "take what is an article of faith for me and legislate it for someone who doesn't share that article of faith."

[Related: U.S. Catholic Bishops Conference Says Pro-Abortion Politicians Should be Shunned - LSN]

Carl Olson has commentary at InsightScoop.

TheTower (CUA's newspaper) reports:

Former presidential candidate John Kerry will speak on campus this semester despite initial opposition by the office of University Center, Student Programs and Events (UCSPE).

The College Democrats will host the Massachusetts senator, who has been approved to speak specifically on environmental concerns and the Iraq war.

UCSPE initially rejected the College Democrats' request in early August, according to junior Mark Arnone, chairman of the College Democrats. Bill Jonas, the director of UCSPE, sent an e-mail to Arnone as well as Michael Nardi, chairman of the College Republicans, highlighting an unwritten University policy banning candidates from campus during an election year.

... Patrick Reilly, the founder of the Cardinal Newman Society which is dedicated to the renewal of Catholic identity in Catholic higher education in the United States, learned about Kerry's scheduled appearance in a phone call with a reporter yesterday.

"This is wrong on so many levels," said Reilly. "For a Catholic university that accepts Catholic moral teachings as truth to invite or to host an active political candidate who intends to uphold and possibly expand the incidents of abortion in the United States is entirely contrary to its Catholic morals."

... When contacted yesterday, Kerry's senate office said that his speech had not been finalized and an exact date for his appearance had not been set, and deferred comment to a later date.

TheTower article, laudably, is very critical of Kerry and disapproves of his invitation. You have to think that Kerry is accepting the invitation out of spite. The College Democrats at CUA, I believe, are a small segment of the campus. Is he rubbing his status in our face? It seems so.

Second, across town, news that the Vatican & U.S Bishops are investigating a Georgetown professor:

John Allen:

Both the Vatican and the U.S. bishops are investigating a book by a prominent American Catholic theologian, Vietnam-born Fr. Peter Phan of Georgetown University.

The book raises issues about the uniqueness of Christ and the church, issues that were also behind recent censures of other high-profile theologians, as well as a recent Vatican declaration that the fullness of the Christian church resides in Catholicism alone.

The case confirms that no subject is of greater doctrinal concern for church authorities, including Pope Benedict XVI, than what they see as “religious relativism,” meaning the impression that Christ is analogous to other religious figures such as the Buddha, or that Christianity is one valid spiritual path among others.

Critics of writers such as Phan, who offer a positive theological evaluation of non-Christian religions, assert that their work courts confusion on these points, while others believe church authorities are drawing the borders of theological discussion too narrowly.

Phan, a priest of the Dallas diocese, is a former president of the Catholic Theological Society of America. The book in question is Phan’s 2004 Being Religious Interreligiously, published by Orbis.

This should all sound oddly-familiar to CUA. (*cough* Charlie Curran *cough.*)

Sherry W at Intentional Disciples reacts:

My initial concern with Phan's work was staggeringly bad history and worse statistics. Phan's ahistorical reading of contemporary Christian missions systemically ignored massively documented realities like the explosive growth of Christianity in the third world which a casual reader could uncover with a 60 second Google search.

I knew that it was almost certainly theology that was driving this strange obtuseness on Phan's part because "missionary failure" would enable him to portray his theological positions as "realism" - the stoic acceptance of the fact that Asians had voted with their feet and rejected Christianity en masse - rather than an ideology that he was asserting in the teeth of overwhelming evidence that Asia (especially China) is on the verge of becoming one of the evangelizing dynamos of the Christian world.

So I'm relieved that serious questions are being raised at the highest level about the theological issues behind the lousy missiology.

The mainstream media is hot on the story. Associated Press:

The U.S. bishops’ Committee on Doctrine has traded correspondence with Phan since July 2005 seeking clarification on his writings, said Sister Mary Ann Walsh, a spokeswoman for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.

"There was not complete satisfaction with his response, which is why the dialogue continues," Walsh said. She did not go into further detail.
Phan declined comment Wednesday.

Mind-bogglingly stupid quotation:

The issues underpinning Phan’s case are causing great debate among Catholic theologians grappling with how Catholicism relates to other faiths outside a European context, said Terrence Tilley, chairman of the theology department at Fordham University and president-elect of the Catholic Theological Society of America.

"To come to judgment as the Vatican seems to be doing so quickly, before theologians have had time to work out and critique the positions ... it’s just premature," Tilley said. "It’s in a sense cutting off debate before the debate’s started."

You have to be kidding me. The debate concerning the nature of the Church has been going strong for, oh, about 1,900 years. Easy. How can Terrence Tilley expect to get away with such a claim?

Hmm, let's think about this. Terrency Tilley, "president-elect of the Catholic Theological Society of America" ... Peter Phan former president of the Catholic Theological Society of America.

There, now it's beginning to make sense.

More news from the front as it emerges....

[NYer]

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