Campus Notes

The John William Pope Center for Higher Education Policy posted a glowing recommendation of The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C., this week for holding fast to its “spiritual anchoring” and insisting “that there really is such a thing as truth”.

From the Pope Center’s review:

[Catholic University] is, as Speaker of the House John Boehner put it during the commencement address May 14, “the center of Catholic intellectual life in America”; it is the national university of the Catholic Church; and it is faithful to its mission.

“CUA is a place where university mission is not in question,” says English department chairman Ernest Suarez. “The university’s Catholic identity is present and active.”…

The [campus] ministry provides many opportunities for students to grow in their faith, ranging from daily Mass to regularly meeting student groups and to nearly a dozen student-led retreats per year.

Collectively, these activities have a powerful impact. “Many students you talk to will say that, before coming to CUA, they were only nominally involved with their faith,” said Henderson. However, the university “seems to be a fertile ground for the conversion of hearts…. Upon coming here and being roped into the campus ministry events that are incorporated into orientation, they experience a rejuvenation—or a first time birth of—fervor for Christ.”

More controversial, though, are the things Catholic University does not allow on campus, such as a recognized club for gay students or an unchallenged platform for public figures that are hostile to Catholic teachings. …

“Our school of theology and religious studies is an integral part of the church’s teaching mission about the truth of the Gospels,” said Catholic University’s president John Garvey in an interview with the Pope Center. When asked about how CUA would handle a professor like UNC-Chapel Hill’s Bart Ehrman, who has made a small fortune selling books arguing that Christianity isn’t true, Garvey was clear. “Somebody who says they’re [i.e. the Gospels] not true is really not teaching what Catholics believe, so there’s a problem with us having somebody like that on the faculty.”…

In summary, it seems that for religious universities to stay on mission they need consistent leadership, both at the administration and church levels. As president Garvey said, a spiritual mission isn’t something that you can hold onto on your own. CUA’s success in this regard—and Yale’s apparent failure—attest to his point.

“Catholic higher education is a heavy cross,” remarked the noted Catholic (and Yalie) William F. Buckley, Jr., in a 1967 speech. “It is blessed only in the sense that the cross is blessed, in that it gives us the heavy opportunity to do our duty.”

Catholic University of America is still willing to take up that cross, and for that, both it and its supporters deserve credit.

Read this entire article at The Pope Center here.

The Catholic University of America is included in The Newman Guide to Choosing a Catholic College for its strong Catholic identity.  Read CUA’s profile here.