Catholics Are Angry....I'd Be, Too!

But I am a Baptist...so my anger is not so strong as theirs.

Catholics who devoutly hold to their church's doctrine are outraged that Notre Dame, the most visible Catholic university in the Western Hemisphere, has invited President Obama to be the commencement speaker at its graduation this year. He will also be receiving an honorary Doctor of Law degree.

I read a most interesting article today by a professor, Ralph McInerny, whose 54-year tenure at Notre Dame will be ending this year with his retirement. He chastises the university for its decision. He should. Notre Dame is abandoning its moral high ground by inviting Obama, a consistently pro-abortion politician, to speak and to be honored. He clearly stands against the teachings of the Catholic Church and cannot be called her friend. And to give him an honorary degree on top of it? What has he done, from the perspective of Scripture, that is worthy of honor?

The article contained these quotes near its end:

...Abortion is an essentially evil act, both from the viewpoint of natural morality and from the explicit teaching the Church. There is no way in which an individual, a politician or an institution can finesse that fact.

By inviting Barack Obama as commencement speaker, Notre Dame is telling the nation that the teaching of the Catholic church on this fundamental matter can be ignored. Lip service may be paid to the teaching on abortion, but it is no impediment to upward mobility, to the truly vulgar lust to be welcomed into secular society, whether on the part of individuals or institutions.

....By inviting Barack Obama to be the 2009 commencement speaker, Notre Dame has forfeited its right to call itself a Catholic university. It invites an official rebuke. May it come.

I think I would be equally outraged if the Protestant university from which I graduated did the same; and if it did, I would likewise be repulsed by the "truly vulgar lust to be welcomed into secular society."

To my Catholic friends and acquaintances: I share your outrage. I hope your university changes its mind and disinvites the President. If my alma mater ever does something like this, I hope you will share mine.