More thoughts on Notre Dame and Obama

I really wish I had been more passionate about these kinds of issues when I was an undergrad.
But when I was an undergrad, I thought as an undergrad.
Which means I didn't really think much.
I mostly just tried to survive any given week's worth of work and extracurriculars.
Sure, I had opinions, but I didn't act on them as much as I should have.
By no means think that I'm projecting my lethargy on undergrads of today, or even my cohort.
My undergrad experience lulled me into a complacency of agency. Sure, I had opinions...but I never bothered to think hard enough about the next step and, say, do things about it.
For instance, in for years as an undergraduate, I don't think I ever attended a licit Mass. I didn't skip "Mass," but I don't think the ones on my campus were valid. Did it occur to me to hop on a bus and go to a real parish?
Nope.
And I think I greatly retarded my spiritual growth by not thinking that far ahead.
This is all mostly a set up to say that, if I were at Notre Dame graduating this year, I would like to imagine that I'd be outraged by the indecorous invitation of Obama...that I'd not attend my own graduation in protest...and a myriad of other politically active acts of cultural subversion.
In reality, though, I'd probably just have been another sheep in the herd.

So I don't really blame the average Notre Dame undergrad for not taking offense to Obama's presence.
Plus, it's hard to blame seniors who have just underwent four years of heretical indoctrination. At least, that's what Notre Dame now appears to be doing to its students due to the Catholic orthodoxy PR disaster that this has turned into.

Another point I'd like to make is about the absurdity of arguments on free speech in this instance. Defenders of Fr. Jenkins, and Fr. Jenkins himself, are arguing that this is an opportunity to have conversation and debate.
This is absurd because that's the actual opposite of the purpose of inviting a commencement speaker.
It is an honorary position, like getting an honorary degree.
You don't invite speakers to debate.
There will be no question and answer session after Obama's address (at least, I hope not...graduations run too long as it is).
There will be no counter-speaker to challenge Obama's views publicly.
You invite a commencement speaker as a bookend to a college career. Such an invitation suggests that this person is a wise role-model; someone whose words are not merely provocative, but ought to be cherished in a memory. They are allowed, one might say, the ultimate last word as far as college education goes.

This is why it is absurd for Obama -- whose policies are often radically antithetical to Catholicism, even if his heart is in the right place -- to be invited as the last word on college at any Catholic campus.

Notre Dame could have invited Obama to speak on a debate panel if it was interested to creating a discourse.

Maybe, and bear with me on this, schools like Notre Dame should establish annual Heretic Lectures. By officially declaring the lecturer heretical, there is certainly no chance of confusing alumni or students or society at large. It would make clear that the invitation is not intended to honor the speaker, other than to honor them as the smartest of people who are intrinsically wrong about truth. Such a lecture would then inspire an exchange of ideas, a challenge of ideas, and, hopefully, a clarification and correction of ideas.

Perhaps what Notre Dame ought to do is declare a Commencement Heretic, so that the students can observe precisely the kind of attractive but essentially wrong ideologies they will have to confront in the real world outside their virtual reality experiment called college life.

With an official Commencement Heretic, everyone will be happy. The college can invite whomever they want, and orthodox students won't have to feel uncomfortable, as if they are complicit in the honoring of evil ideologies by attending their own graduation. I'm not sure how the Commencement Heretic would feel about his title -- some might quite enjoy it -- and those that don't would probably still be willing to accept it so long as they get a speaker's honorarium. Incidentally, I understand that the speaker's honorarium is often given to charity.

...I wonder to what charity Obama would make Notre Dame give its money...he's already going to make us all donate money for the destruction of those greedy embryos, who, like microscopic misers, think they can keep their genetic material all to themselves when other people need it more. Hmmm...Obama as the redistributor of genetic wealth...I think I feel another blog post coming on.

Comments

[zack]

I think if you really are that worried about them inviting Obama just because of your religious beliefs and his beliefs you are not respecting him as our president nor are you respecting america.

Read more about it in my blog:

http://www.thisisawebsite.info/2009/03/27/why-notre-dame-is-not-an-embarrassment/

[Akh Ari]

On the contrary, Zack, it is not Peter but you who lacks respect for both President Obama and America.

Peter may disagree with Obama, but surely you will agree that one can disagree with someone and still respect him. Peter does Obama the credit of thinking that his beliefs and opinions really matter and have consequences that matter.

You, on the other hand, seem to think that the ideas, words, and actions of the President of our country - even on questions of who lives and who dies (and who decides) - have no real importance and in the end count for nothing.

I have found that in cases where many adults seemed to think something very important to be at stake but in which I failed to see what all the fuss was about, the reality of the situation was very often that there was a certain amount of important information of which they were not ignorant but I was.

Judging from your comment and blog post, it seems that you have a lot to learn about the Catholic Church, as well as about American democracy and about thoughtful discourse in general. I heartily invite you to take a deeper look into all three.

[Akh Ari]

P.S. When a Catholic like Peter uses the word "heretic," it is NOT an insult-word like "nincompoop" and it is NOT a shorthand for "person I hate." It a technical term with a well-defined meaning: "One who professes the Christian faith, but corrupts its dogmas."

[PeterTerp]

Thanks for the backup, Akh Ari.

I think zack might be missing the point that what I'm most worried about is the administration of Notre Dame respecting its own mission as a Catholic institution.

Obama has a lot of talent; I readily give him that. But his belief system is not compatible with the Catholic Church.

It seems to me that a commencement speaker should be someone that the school would be proud to have had as a student. No Catholic institution could really say that Obama is their ideal model for the kind of student it would hope to produce, because that would mean that a Catholic institution would be proud to produce someone who professes beliefs that are antithetical to basic human rights.

It wouldn't be a problem if a more secular institution like Harvard or Yale had Obama as a commencement speaker. What is shocking is not that the president should be a speaker. It's not even that he isn't Catholic.
It's that he promotes the violation of intrinsic human rights that the Catholic Church strives so hard to protect.

Notre Dame makes a mockery of its Catholic identity by honoring such a speaker.

Obama has a right to state his opinion in a public forum.

He does not have a right to be invited to state his opinion at a private, Catholic university. He does not have a right to Notre Dame as his speaking platform or its graduates as an audience.