Institutional Splinter

I've been toying for some time with the idea of writing an essay on how the Church has, in recent times, squandered its moral authority. Long thought about the events surrounding the Notre Dame invitation to President Obama have rekindled the idea. Whether what follows will ever make it into such an essay are impossible to say. They do, nevertheless, fit all too well with my earlier thinking.

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The recent case of the President and Notre Dame offers an unexpected glimpse into the nature of the current problem with the Church hierarchy’s moral authority. The situation is pretty simple: Notre Dame, as it is wont to do, invited the President of the United States to give the 2009 graduation address and to receive an honorary degree. Once the President’s acceptance was publicized, objections by Catholic alumni and bishops rang out. Obama’s direct and active support for abortion and embryonic stem cell research puts him in opposition to an infallible teaching of the Church. If anyone does, Obama meets the U.S. Bishops’ ban on honoring pro-abortion politicians:

The Catholic community and Catholic institutions should not honor those who act in defiance of our fundamental moral principles. They should not be given awards, honors or platforms which would suggest support for their actions.

Washington’s Cardinal McCarrick, then chairman of the Task Force on Catholic Bishops and Catholic Politicians, said in November, 2004, that

[t]he Task Force plans to consult with leaders in Catholic education, Catholic health care, and Catholic social services to discuss how we can together best carry out this guidance.

If we don’t presume that, four and a half years later, the Task Force has yet to consult with such a preeminent member of Catholic education, we are left with only two possible conclusions: either this invitation and honor are in accord with the instruction (which is implausible) or Notre Dame has simply rejected it. Bishop Olmsted of Phoenix clearly thinks that the latter is the case, calling the invitation "a public act of disobedience to the Bishops of the United States" in his March 25th letter to Notre Dame’s president, Fr. Jenkins.

But here’s the rub: where are the bishops who oppose Notre Dame’s invitation - or any other bishops, for that matter - who unambiguously correct the members of their own flock that voted to elect Obama in spite (or, because) of his manifest intent to "act in defiance of [the Church’s] fundamental moral principles"? Ultimately, criticizing the collective, Notre Dame, is easy. Francis Cardinal George has said that "Notre Dame didn't understand what it means to be Catholic when they issued this invitation". Harder to say is, "Fr. Jenkins didn’t understand what it means to be Catholic…". Harder, still, for a bishop to say is, "My own flock didn’t understand what it means to be Catholic when it voted."

To blame Notre Dame or, even, Fr. Jenkins ultimately means that the criticizing bishop lacks any share of responsibility. On the other hand, for him to chastise his own flock for failing to distinguish itself on this essential matter is reflexive, pointing to his lack of success as an effective teacher of the Good News. Ironic that, in this season of conversion and penance, our bishops are focusing on the splinter in the institutional eye of someone else’s flock.