Should Obama speak at Notre Dame?

Some Fighting Irish are fighting mad about the prospect of an American president addressing graduates at the spring commencement. Should Roman Catholic colleges and universities roll out the red carpet for a sitting president if he doesn’t agree with the church’s stance regarding abortion?

Rev. Robert Barron, a seminary professor in Mundelein and one of the Chicago Archdiocese’s most respected homilists, says no way. A college freshman at the University of Notre Dame before entering college seminary in the late 1970s, Barron has paid close attention to the controversy swirling around the university’s invitation to Barack Obama to deliver the commencement speech in South Bend and receive an honorary law degree.

"President Obama is, obviously, a man of many virtues and accomplishments, and a decent human being. But he holds to a public position—legal protection for practically unlimited access to abortion—that is directly repugnant to Catholic moral teaching and anthropology," Barron said. "To make matters worse, President Obama’s advocacy of the Freedom of Choice Act makes him the most radically pro-abortion president in our history."

"The critics mistake this for ‘one issue’ politics. It is, in fact, taking a stand against a fundamental ethical indifferentism," Barron said. "And this is why I join a swelling chorus of those who say someone who holds to the pro-choice position as fully and enthusiastically as the president does should not be given a platform at a university that claims a Catholic heritage and identity."

About 65,000 people agree with Barron. They have signed a petition protesting Obama’s anticipated May 17 commencement speech at the University of Notre Dame, saying the president’s views on abortion and stem cell research "directly contradict" Roman Catholic teachings.

But Rev. Thomas Reese, a senior fellow at Georgetown University’s Woodstock Theological Center, says ho-hum.

"Controversy over commencement speakers at Catholic universities pops up every spring along with the tulips," he wrote. He also points to at least one cardinal who honored Obama as well as other speakers in favor of abortion rights.

"This is absurd. If Cardinal Edward Egan of New York can invite Obama to speak at the Al Smith dinner in October of 2008 when he was only a presidential candidate, then there is certainly nothing wrong with Notre Dame having the president speak at a commencement," Reese said. "What is OK for a cardinal archbishop is certainly OK for a university."

"People need to recognize that Catholic universities have to be places where freedom of speech and discussion is recognized and valued," Reese added. "Not to allow a diversity of speakers on campus is to put Catholic universities into a ghetto."

Barron calls this approach hypocritical.

"Anyone even vaguely associated with the secular academy knows that it is governed by a fairly strict ideological orthodoxy and marked by many forms of censorship, both explicit and implicit," Barron said.

He might have a point. Remember when Pope Benedict XVI tried to speak at Sapienza University in Rome last year? Students and professors protested the pontiff’s planned visit to the university to mark its opening day for the 2008 academic year because of previous remarks rationalizing the church’s trial and conviction of Galileo. The pope canceled his appearance.

Now the tables are turned. But would disinviting an American president smack of bad manners and un-Christ-like behavior? What do you think?

Story Source:http://newsblogs.chicagotribune.com/religion_theseeker/2009/03/notre-dame-scandal-.html