Obama at Notre Dame: The Long Term Effect

I have held off commenting on Obama at Notre Dame. I had a few things to say in the run up, but I've been reading the reaction from a number of commentators. I think the award for most perceptive analysis goes to George Weigel, who discusses Obama's attempt to re-define true American Catholicism. The money quote:

"What was surprising, and ought to be disturbing to anyone who cares about religious freedom in these United States, was the president’s decision to insert himself into the ongoing Catholic debate over the boundaries of Catholic identity and the applicability of settled Catholic conviction in the public square. Obama did this by suggesting, not altogether subtly, who the real Catholics in America are."

As Father Z puts it: "Who needs The Tudors? This was like watching Henry suborn the English Church away from the interference of Rome. . . As one person put it, 'America has a new pope!'"

If you think this is far-fetched, read Hans Kung's worshipful words about Obama expressing the wish that Obama were pope instead of Benedict XVI. For the Catholic Left, politics is everything and theology is a trivial matter. Yes, they really want to follow Obama rather than Benedict XVI. Obama represents a serious threat to the unity of the Church and an actual, heretical, false messiah-figure who is perfectly capable of leading many astray.

Here are two excerpts from the speech, which, I believe, sum up the essence of the Obama position and the Obama problem.

"As I considered the controversy surrounding my visit here, I was reminded of an encounter I had during my Senate campaign, one that I describe in a book I wrote called The Audacity of Hope. A few days after I won the Democratic nomination, I received an email from a doctor who told me that while he voted for me in the primary, he had a serious concern that might prevent him from voting for me in the general election. He described himself as a Christian who was strongly pro-life, but that's not what was preventing him from voting for me.
What bothered the doctor was an entry that my campaign staff had posted on my website - an entry that said I would fight "right-wing ideologues who want to take away a woman's right to choose." The doctor said that he had assumed I was a reasonable person, but that if I truly believed that every pro-life individual was simply an ideologue who wanted to inflict suffering on women, then I was not very reasonable. He wrote, "I do not ask at this point that you oppose abortion, only that you speak about this issue in fair-minded words."

Fair-minded words.

After I read the doctor's letter, I wrote back to him and thanked him. I didn't change my position, but I did tell my staff to change the words on my website. And I said a prayer that night that I might extend the same presumption of good faith to others that the doctor had extended to me. Because when we do that - when we open our hearts and our minds to those who may not think like we do or believe what we do - that's when we discover at least the possibility of common ground."

And another:

"Understand - I do not suggest that the debate surrounding abortion can or should go away. No matter how much we may want to fudge it - indeed, while we know that the views of most Americans on the subject are complex and even contradictory - the fact is that at some level, the views of the two camps are irreconcilable."

Notice what Obama has done here. In response to a doctor who sounded like a likely convert - someone who just needed to be stroked a little in order to be reeled in - Obama changed some words. Not his position. He just took out some inflamatory rhetoric designed to demonize his opponents. But he did not change his position one iota. He does not want dialogue; he wants converts. His offer is that he will respect you and not call you names if you promise not to oppose what he is doing. And what he is doing is the bidding of the most extreme, pro-abortion groups in America.

In the second quote, he winks at his base just to let them know that he is not getting swayed by all the Catholic atmosphere at ND and giving up the fight. Oh, no, the differences are irreconcilable. In that case, what hope is there in dialogue? When Randall Terry says this, he is a narrow-minded, intolerant, violent fundamentalist. When President Obama says it, he is wise, conciliatory, realistic and nuanced. How must Fr. Jenkins have felt to have his plea for "dialogue" thrown back in his face? After all he risked in inviting Obama, now the President just says his views and those of the Catholic Church are "irreconcilable."

So the message is, given that the two views are irreconcilable, are you going to get with the program and stop insisting that abortion must be banned, in which case you can be regarded as "reasonable," "nuanced," "inclined to dialogue" and "realistic?" Or are you going to act as if the debate were still going on and as if there was still a possibility of change? Are you with me or with the evildoers, he might as well have said.

UPDATE:
OK, Jon Shields has said it far more reasonably and calmly than I did. He deftly dissects Obama's contradictory statements on Roe v. Wade and asks for a philosophically coherent argument from a President who is, after all, a constitutional law professor. Read him and you may understand why people like me get so upset with Obama.

Mary Ann Glendon Declines Nortre Dame

Mary Ann Glendon, who was scheduled to receive a medal at the Notre Dame Commencement Ceremony next month, while Barack Obama was receiving an honorary degree, has released a letter to President Jenkins to the media. She writes:

"First, as a longtime consultant to the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, I could not help but be dismayed by the news that Notre Dame also planned to award the president an honorary degree. This, as you must know, was in disregard of the U.S. bishops’ express request of 2004 that Catholic institutions “should not honor those who act in defiance of our fundamental moral principles” and that such persons “should not be given awards, honors or platforms which would suggest support for their actions.” That request, which in no way seeks to control or interfere with an institution’s freedom to invite and engage in serious debate with whomever it wishes, seems to me so reasonable that I am at a loss to understand why a Catholic university should disrespect it."

It can be read in its entirety here. Mary Ann Glendon, the Learned Hand Professor of Law at Harvard School and former US ambassador to the Vatican, has rendered noble service to the prolife cause and her action will heap further embarrassment on Father Jenkins and Notre Shame, embarrassment which is richly deserved and completely unnecessary but for their ill-conceived decision to honour the most prominant suppoter of abortion in the world today.

You Either Have to Laugh or Cry at the University of Notre Shame!

I have refrained so far from commenting on the University of Notre Dame decision to award an honourary doctor of laws degree on President Barack Obama next month. The blogosphere has been aflame and the number of American bishops condemning the decision stands, at last count, at about 31 or so. Some of the letters have referred to UND as a "formerly" Catholic university, some have expressed concern for President Jenkins' soul and others have assured the university administration that it should expect no support in future from the undersigned. The University is clearly in violation of the directives of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops that Catholic universities should not give honours to those who contradict fundamental teachings of the Church.

But my personal favorite letter so far is from Bishop Bruskewitz, who rightly connects this scandal to the lax approach to sexual promiscuity on campus and who is so insulted that he even finds Jenkins' past association with Nebraska painful! (Jenkins had the termerity to be born in Omaha.) And the good Bishop's conciseness and clarity warms the heart of this college professor immensely.

"Reverend and dear Father Jenkins,
Permit me to add my name as well to the long list of Bishops of the Catholic Church who are utterly appalled at your dedication to immorality and wrong-doing represented by your support for the obscenity called “The Vagina Monologues” and your absolute indifference to the murderous abortion program and beliefs of this President of the United States.

The fact that you have some sort of past connection with the State of Nebraska makes it all the more painful that the Catholic people here have to see your betrayal of the moral teachings of the Catholic Church. I can assure you of my prayers for your conversion, and for the conversion of your formerly Catholic University.

I am, Sincerely yours in Christ Jesus,
The Most Reverend Fabian W. Bruskewitz Bishop of Lincoln

Come on, Bishop, tell what you really think! Not much Irish indirectness here, but what can you expect from a guy named "Bruskewitz?"

Notre Dame apparently still is so insecure that it cannot restrain itself from throwing itself at anyone of fame, money or influence, even the most pro-abortion president in history, in order to raise its stock in the eyes of those who hate Catholicism but might be persuaded to like Notre Dame if it is compliant and ingratiating enough. We all knew girls like this in high school; you know, the ones known as "easy" and other terms that are not allowed on this blog.

But the recent explanation of Fr. Jenkins to his board of how the invitation does not really violate the bishops guidelines, since Obama is not a Catholic and the Guidelines were not meant to prohibit Catholic institutions from honouring non-Catholics (and some canon lawyer said so), is just over the top funny! (I choose to laugh rather than cry, since to be a Christian is to know that life is a comedy not a tragedy.) Really, since Jenkins is not a Jesuit, I think we should all withdraw all the "Jesuitical causistry" jokes; to call Fr. Jenkins' comments "Jesuitcal" is an insult to Jesuits everywhere. Maybe we should now refer to "Holy Cross-istry" or "Holy Cross-ical Causistry" when we want to mock someone's insincere, evasive, bad faith attempts to skirt the rules in the name of permissiveness.

To suppose that the bishops intended that honouring bad Catholics is forbidden but honouring non-Catholics, no matter if they are racist, war-mongering, adulterous, thieving, lying, law-breaking, profane Nazis, is just fine by them, is to cross the line from scandal into farce.

Fr. Jenkins' sophistries are dissected here and mocked here.

Stop the Press!
Wait a minute; perhaps the Jesuits are not off the hook after all. I just found out that Fr. Jenkins earned a Licentiate in Sacred Theology from - wait for it - the Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley in 1988! It is nice to see someone applying their education in real life!