Posted on 02/27/2006 10:26:11 AM PST by annalex
Tom Monaghan, the founder of the Domino's Pizza chain, has stirred protests from civil rights activists by declaring that Ave Maria's pharmacies will not be allowed to sell condoms or birth control pills. The town's cable television network will carry no X-rated channels.
The town will be centred on a 30m tall oratory and the first Catholic university to be built in the US for 40 years.
The university's president, Nicholas J. Healy, has said future students should "help rebuild the city of God" in a country suffering from "catastrophic cultural collapse".
Monaghan, 68, sold his takeaway chain in 1998 for an estimated $1.5 billion.
A devout Catholic who has ploughed millions into religious projects - including radio stations, primary schools and a Catholic law faculty in Michigan - Monaghan has bought about 2000ha previously used by migrant farmers.
The land on the western edge of the Everglades swamp will eventually house up to 30,000 people, with 5000 students living on the university campus.
Florida officials have declared the project a development bonanza for a depressed area and Governor Jeb Bush attended a groundbreaking ceremony for the university earlier this month.
Civil rights activists and other watchdogs concerned about the separation of church and state are threatening lawsuits if Ave Maria attempts to enforce Catholic dogma - none of which has deterred Monaghan, who initially tried to build his new university in Michigan but could not get permission.
Asked recently about possible lawsuits in Florida, he replied: "That's great. That would be the best publicity we could get."
Monaghan was sent to a Catholic orphanage with his brother James after the death of their father on Christmas Eve 1941. After serving with the US Marines and later dropping out of university, he founded Domino's in 1960 with his brother, who sold back his share for a Volkswagen Beetle.
Monaghan then set about building what became America's second-largest pizza chain. He collected antique cars, bought a yacht and became the owner of the Detroit Tigers baseball team.
About 15 years ago he read Mere Christianity by CS Lewis. "That was a big turnaround," he said recently. "I decided to simplify my life. No more airplanes, no more yachts. It's been a big relief."
Sources close to the project said Monaghan was particularly disturbed by what he regards as the failure of Western civilisation to resist Islamic fundamentalism. In a speech to students last year Healy warned that Islam "no longer faces a religiously dynamic West".
From The Sunday Times
God Bless you and your stand for your friend! God knows, the man has done more for the Catholic cause than most have done in each of our lifetimes.
I stand my mine as well!
(giving up FR for lent and have to get my kiddies to activities today, so if you don't see me for a while, I'm suffering in silence)
From what I've seen, Ave Maria University will not be a monastery. The students at the school go out into the community to do service, as tutors in the local schools, to witness and pray at a local abortion clinic, and helping Habitat for Humanity. There is plenty of interaction between the towns of Naples and Immokalee and the school. I imagine that will continue when the town of Ave Maria is built.
I too hope they spread out and start trying to force everyone else to become Catholic. I honestly hope such a movement begins. I'm tired of waiting for the inevitable result and that is the honest truth.
Nope, I don't live in MI, I live in MA, and have not been affected by any of the elementary schools closing. Schools do close, though, when there is not enough support for them. It happens all the time. It happened at MY Catholic school in MS. When my older siblings were there, there was a high school. When I entered the 8th grade, ours was the highest grade. After a few years, it was lowered to the 6th grade. Only in the last 10 years have they brought it back up to the 8th grade, and they're considering bringing the high school back. That's because those kids who were affected by the removal of the higher grades now have kids moving into those grades and they want for their kids what they didn't have.
Yes, and it wasn't Catholic in many places and was very upright and moral, unlike the Northeast and Louisiana.
But if people want to enter the monastic life, they can. The Vatican wasn't built on an island in the South Pacific. It's smack dab in the middle of Western Civilization, and gave Western Civilization countless accomplishments in science and the arts and literature and architecture in addition to theology. It's in the world not of the world.
If anything, families need to strengthen the parishes where they live and become a become a beacon of light to people living across the street. Isolation tends to reduce one's relevance, not increase it. e.g., the Amish.
I understand what they are aiming for, but there's a fine line between following God's law with zeal and following God's law at the expense of neglecting your neighbor's salvation. The Pharisees were prime examples of people who isolated themselves and followed the law to the letter, but ignored their un-schooled flock. My head says, "yeah, awesome idea!" but my heart is saying, "no, these people are casting judgment on those who don't share our faith, and instead of helping them, are hiding from them."
Put it this way: The whole movement of "rapture" adherents is based in the notion that they are of a superior holiness to everyone else, and the because of that, they are separate and therefore worthy of being spared the suffering of chastisement. In fact, you and I are pretty much worthless (and condemnable!) to them unless we agree with their beliefs. They're an isolated group, albeit one with some firepower in the "Left Behind" saga. We, as Catholics, believe this is a ridiculous notion - that NO ONE gets a free pass - that my sins alone were enough to crucify Jesus. It seems a bit arrogant to assume that Ave Maria, Florida would automatically be holier than, say, Orlando. Last I checked, everyone sins. And if someone wants to buy condoms, they can order them on the Internet and continue to sin in spite of whatever rules such a community wants to institute.
So, this notion of building a Utopian-Catholic community is laudable in its goal of creating a community that has policies which oppose sin, but Jesus, Himself, said that He would leave the 99 obedient sheep to go and find the 1 one who strayed. This idea sounds a lot like taking the 99 sheep and leaving the one behind.
Every individual makes choices. Regardless of the temptations, it's within everyone's power to lead a holy life. And with (presumably) a Catholic parish in most communities, there is an eternal, supernatural source of strength and wisdom to guide people on the right path. We have a responsibility to bear fruit where God has placed us in this life. It would be irresponsible to pull up stakes and abandon the fight (and those we are called to evangelize) because Walgreens sells condoms.
Just my .02 (okay, maybe it was .03)
What's going to stop someone from looking at porn on the Internet or getting a mail-order prescription to Playboy?
Isn't the community equally desecrated by those actions?
I do not think the success, such as it is, of the Amish is very relevant to the eventual fate of Ave Maria. That is because the state (I use the word in its socio-political rather that uniquely American form-of-government sense) is not threatened by the Amish in the way it is threatened by Ave Maria. Or even if it is really threatened by the Amish as well, it does not perceive the threat. That is because we won't see America en masse abandoning electricity, modern dentistry, and such. But we may very well see America adopting local law consistent with the Divine Law, and if it does, these communities will prosper not only in the spiritual sense but also in the modern economic sense. And that would mean the end of the state's client classes, state skulz, state-protected pornographers, and state-protected abortionists. I think, all the guns will be out for this town faster than you can say "Ave Maria". Or "Waco".
I agree, but Ave Maria is not conceived as a monastery, is it? It is supposed to be a regular town with lay people in worldy economic pursuits. The only thing that will be absent is legal protections our government erected for sin.
Other than in the misleading title, where do you see that? No one will be forced to live there. It is a new town.
Your argument makes sense. But my belief is that our society is now so debased that there is a place for communities like this which will facilitate the raising of well-formed Catholic children.
I visited Seaside, Florida on business at the time that movie was filmed there. They did not have hardly any props, and the actual town was readily recognizable in the movie. It is a nice town and it has character, don't know about soul. It has existed for a few decades. The vision was purely architectural: small lots, plenty of walking/biking space, community buildings, that kind of thing. This creates an environment where people bump into each other, making for a lively public space, uncommon in America. I haven't been to Celebration, but I would not describe Seaside as creepy. The movie, of course, introduced the creepiness in spades.
Sounds good. I just used the monastery as a loose analogy for what Tom is doing.
Celebration is creepy 8-) from its faux olde water tower at the entrance, to the three shades of off-white houses, to the seemingly endless grid of streets and canals. It's worth seeing.
I'm confident the kids will be well educated. Our daughter got her application materials completed and mailed last Thursday, so now we're just gonna have to wait and see.
BTW-I haven't had much time to research the Amish perspective. Most sites seem to indicate everything is find. It just that it seems in the back of my mind a few years ago I read about problems. I'm not sure.
I don't remember a religious group. But ideas of secession, cultural or otherwise, are not uncommon.
There is a lot of thinking about making the South (sans Florida, it seems) a conservative stronghold. I vaguely recall someone, I believe by the name Michael Pierce calling us all under the flag of St. Andrew.
Walt Williams suggested Texiana to be formed from Texas and Louisiana.
There is a movement consisting of libertarians to resettle in one state, and move it in a libertarian direction. They are called Free State Project and they chose New Hampshire.
Problem is, most ideas of self-government come from libertarians, but they do not have a clear concept of moral law. How many Christian conservatives would like minimal taxation and no public schools if the community also legalizes drugs, gambling and prostitution, and won't do anything about abortion or gay "marriage"? How many libertarians would stomach localy enforced prohibitions on vice, adultery, or Sunday shopping? The two worldviews do not seem at all compatible.
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