Posted on 05/13/2008 8:06:31 AM PDT by NYer
The best evidence yet that the drumbeat against public support of pro-abortion Catholic pols at Catholic institutions is having an effect appears in the Boston Globe of all places.
The Globe tells us how the personally opposed prevaricators are just not getting the choice commencement invites from Catholic Institutions to which they had shamefully become accustomed.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is one of the nation's most powerful Catholics, but this year the only commencement address she gave was at one of the eight campuses of Miami Dade College.Poor dears. Echoing Cardinal O'Malley, good!
Senator John F. Kerry is headlining three commencements this year - the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, UMass Lowell, and Wheelock College - but it's been nine years since he's done one at a Catholic institution, Boston College Law School.
As for the scion of the nation's most famous Catholic family, Senator Edward M. Kennedy, his major commencement address this year is at Wesleyan University, founded by Methodists.
After repeatedly getting criticized by conservative Catholics, and after years of pressure from the Vatican and some American bishops, Catholic colleges and universities are now shying away from politicians - especially those who, like Kennedy, Kerry, and Pelosi, support abortion rights - as commencement speakers and honorary degree recipients.
Instead, the schools are scrutinizing the public records of potential honorees for evidence of open dissent from key church teachings, especially on abortion, and they are choosing noncontroversial church insiders or nonpolitical figures for their most prominent honors. "I think there's a concerted effort to use the moment of naming people who reinforce the Catholic identity of our institutions, and I'm pleased by that," Cardinal Sean P. O'Malley of Boston said in an interview.
The Cardinal Newman Society, a conservative organization that each year scrutinizes the hundreds of men and women who are given honorary degrees by the nation's 225 Catholic colleges and graduate institutions, has identified a dwindling number of honorees who dissent from the church on key moral teachings - 24 in 2006, 13 in 2007, and six thus far this year.Hats off to the Cardinal Newman Society. While there are still institutions that run afoul of Ex Corde Ecclesiae, progress is being made. Take this quote from the Rev. D. Paul Sullins, a professor of sociology at Catholic University.
"When a Catholic college administrator deliberately chooses a person who is publicly opposing the church, it raises serious flags, and very often the schools choosing those commencement speakers have problems across the board in terms of applying their Catholic identity to what they do," said Patrick J. Reilly, the president of the Cardinal Newman Society.
[He] noted that while his university "has never honored any real Catholic dissenter," in past years there have been speakers whose primary claim to fame was not their Catholicism. This year, though, the university chose the head of the Knights of Columbus."It doesn't get more Catholic than that," he said.
No, it doesn't get more Catholic than that!
All it took was some LEADERSHIP!!! YEAH!!
This is Notre Dame’s speaker. Anybody know about him?
ardinal Theodore McCarrick to deliver 2008 Commencement address
By: Dennis Brown
Date: April 2, 2008
Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick, archbishop emeritus of Washington, D.C., will be the principal speaker and the recipient of an honorary doctor of laws degree at the University of Notre Dame’s 163rd Commencement exercises May 18 (Sunday) in the Joyce Center arena on campus.
“For many years, Cardinal McCarrick has loyally advised, assisted, supported and inspired our University community,” said Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., Notre Dame’s president. “He was an indispensable participant in our recent and joyful celebration of the beatification of Blessed Father Basil Moreau, whose witness paved the way for Notre Dame’s foundation. He once said that he would love to have met Father Moreau, and that he counted himself among our founder’s friends. We certainly count Cardinal McCarrick so, and look forward to celebrating his membership in the Notre Dame family.”
Cardinal McCarrick presided at a Mass of thanksgiving at the beatification ceremony in Le Mans, France, in September for Blessed Father Moreau, founder of the Congregation of Holy Cross, Notre Dame’s founding religious community. He also spoke on campus at a conference in January organized in celebration of Father Moreau’s first feast day.
Cardinal McCarrick served from January 2001 to May 2006 as archbishop of Washington, a position that includes serving as chancellor of The Catholic University of America and president of the Board of Trustees of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.
As archbishop of the nation’s capital, he placed an emphasis on vocations, education and meeting the needs of new immigrants.
In Washington and previously in Newark, N.J., he established seminaries to educate diocesan missionary priests. These two seminaries in Kearny, N.J., and Hyattsville, Md., prepare diocesan priests for work both at home and abroad. In June 2006, Cardinal McCarrick ordained 12 men to the priesthood, the largest ordination class in the Archdiocese of Washington since the 1970s.
In 2004, he supported creation of the DC Opportunity Scholarship Program, a federal initiative that gives low-income families the option of choosing a public or non-public school for their children. The program has led to Catholic schools in the District enrolling some 1,000 scholarship recipients. The cardinal also initiated plans that led to the creation of a new Catholic high school – the first in D.C. in decades – in the fall of 2007.
During his five years as archbishop, Cardinal McCarrick oversaw the start of a multi-cultural and social service center in Wheaton, Md.; the establishment of a Lay Leadership Institute in Silver Spring, Md., which focuses on the Hispanic community; and the reorganization of four of the archdiocese’s social service agencies into one entity, Catholic Community Services, which assists more than 120,000 people annually.
Cardinal McCarrick, who was archbishop of Newark for the 14 years prior to his appointment in Washington, also has been a leader in international human rights, justice and peace issues. He has headed the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) committees on migration, domestic policy, aid to the Church in Central and Eastern Europe, and international policy. For the Vatican, he has served on the Administration of the Patrimony of the Holy See, and on the pontifical councils for promoting Christian unity, justice and peace, pastoral care of migrants and itinerant peoples, and Latin America. He continues to serve on the board of Catholic Relief Services and as chairman of the CRS Foundation.
In service to the nation, Cardinal McCarrick was a member of the Secretary of State’s Advisory Committee on Religious Freedom Abroad and the United States Commission for International Religious Freedom.
A native of New York City, Cardinal McCarrick attended Fordham University and St. Joseph’s Seminary, from which he earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in history. He was ordained to the priesthood by Cardinal Francis Spellman in 1958, and he went on to earn a second master’s degree in social sciences and a doctorate in sociology from The Catholic University of America (CUA).
Prior to his appointment as archbishop of Newark, Cardinal McCarrick served in administrative positions at CUA, as president of the Catholic University of Puerto Rico, in several positions for Cardinal Terence Cooke in New York City, and as the founding bishop of the Diocese of Metuchen, N.J., in 1981.
Cardinal McCarrick, 77, was one of the 115 cardinals who participated in the conclave that elected Pope Benedict XVI in April 2005. He speaks five languages: English, French, German, Italian and Spanish.
Usually I’m disappointed with the pro-aborts ND brings to campus. I’m not sure about this D.C. cardinal, but I suspect the worst.
He is a cardinal whose resignation (all bishops MUST submit resignations upon reaching age 75) was immediately accepted by the pope. The resignation of a cardinal who the pope thinks is performing satisfactorily are not accepted.
That says a lot.
I won’t go into the rumors.
It is a good sign that ND chose a cardinal. Even with his problems, he is not an outright heretic like some speakers in the past.
Finally movement in the right direction! Thank God!
Especially if it is Anderson. The Church has found a jewel, and I hope they use him.
McCarrick thinks he is mainstream, but he’s not. Neither is the president of ND.
BTTT! Guess the bishops got the message!
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