To the sender:
Thank you for your e-mail concerning the performances of "The Vagina Monologues" at Notre Dame. The performances were under the sponsorship of the the Gender Studies Program and the Department of Film, Television and Theatre, and proceeds from ticket sales were donated to Saint Joseph County Sex Offense Services, a local women's shelter, and a national fund to aid Afghani women.
This is one of those occasions when the discordance of contemporary culture and Catholicism becomes very publicly apparent, but the fact is that the University's faculty and students confront this discordance continually in the course of examining the modern world. It certainly is true that the language of "The Vagina Monologues" is often crude and vulgar and that its world view is at odds with Catholic teaching, but could the same not be said for any number of modern novels, plays and films our students encounter --James Joyce's "Ulysses," for example? Should it not be read or taught or discussed at Notre Dame because of its sexual content, crude language, and rude treatment of Catholicism? Should Norman Mailer's novels, or John Updike's or Philip Roth's, or the plays of Edward Albee or the films of Martin Scorcese not be studied here? How much indeed of all modern literature, drama or film could stand up to a test of conformity with Catholic teaching?
Our contemporary culture certainly is not Catholic, nor even, many would argue, Christian; it is aggressively secular and routinely mocks the very notion of belief. A Catholic institution will not embrace that culture, but neither can a Catholic educational institution ignore it. "The Vagina Monologues" has become the centerpiece of a national movement to raise awareness and lessen the incidence of sexual violence against women. Along with the content that many find offensive, the Monologues include statistics and accounts of child sexual molestation, the systematic rape of Bosnian women, and female genital mutilation in Africa and elsewhere in the world. The movement that has grown up around the Monologues has attracted especially strong support on college campuses, including Notre Dame. How should a Catholic university community react to a phenomenon such as the Monologues? How should individuals react from the standpoint of their faith? Can one support the Monologues' positive aim, i.e., condemning sexual violence against women, while abhoring its moral confusion?
That is the debate taking place now in the Notre Dame community. It has filled the campus newspaper's Viewpoint pages over the past week and has been very much a "Catholic" argument, with students and others on both sides of the issue arguing from the standpoint of their faith. Whatever one may think of the content of the Monologues, is this not precisely the kind of debate that should take place at a Catholic university in a time and culture that render our beliefs so resoundingly countercultural?
Obviously, people of good will--and good faith--can argue the answer to that question.
Peace,
Dennis Moore
Mr. Moore, I have read your response. My initial reaction is, shame on you. In my day at Notre Dame, there was a nightclub on S. Michigan Street called "The Torch Club", where nude and lewd dancing took place. Yes, that type of thing goes on in the world. Should it have taken place on the ND campus, because it took place in downtown South Bend? No.
This calls to mind a couple of other recent episodes where you and other administrators did not exactly cover yourselves in glory. First is the appearance on campus of Sen. Joseph Lieberman, the pro-abortion Hebraic American. If he wanted to spew his pro-abort garbage and woo voters in Indiana, he certainly could have gone to the St. Joseph County courthouse steps. No. He wanted to have his viewpoint legitimized with the famed Marian Shrine, the Golden Dome, in the background (never mind that in the Talmud, to which Lieberman ascribes, views Our Blessed Mother as a prostitute). As a pro-abort who spits on Our Blessed Mother every time he runs his mouth about "freedom of choice", he should have been categorically excluded from campus.
Further, Notre Dame is guilty of broadcasting tasteless NBC sit-coms, which at the very least are immoral, and are actually pernicious and anti-Catholic in nature. If you don't believe me on this, take a look at the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights' web site, www.catholicleague.org.
It amazes me that, in the name of "academic freedom", ND allows utter trash and filth like the "Monologues" on campus, and yet does not allow even one traditional Latin Mass in any of the churches or chapels on campus. Notre Dame Magazine a couple of years ago ran an article by a "history professor" which excoriated the traditional Latin Mass, the Mass great martyrs like St. Thomas More and St. Oliver Plunkett died for, the one my Irish ancestors were persecuted for.
There have been very few times in the past 30 years that I have been ashamed to be a Notre Dame man. The "Monologues" incident is one of them. This incident has proven correct Judge Robert Bork's notable statement in "Slouching Toward Gomorrah"--the President of Notre Dame cares more about what the presidents of Harvard and Yale think than what the Pope thinks.
Notre Dame and St. Mary's ought to be three square miles of truth and decency. To the extent you defend the "Monologues" incident, you fail in your duties as a Catholic and as a man. Shame on you. Yours in Notre Dame, ND76