Oakes on Higher Ed. and Religious Identity

In light of the posts in recent days on academic freedom and the "Vagina Monologues" at Notre Dame, and the Hochschild dust-up at Wheaton, this NRO essay, "Keeping the Faith," by J. Stanley Oakes, might be of interest.  He writes: 

[A] religious college that sticks to its traditions is not — or at least not automatically — guilty of intolerance. Is it really intolerance . . . when Notre Dame's new president, Rev. John Jenkins, worries that almost half of the professors at his Catholic university are non-Catholic? Doesn't the institution, at some point, morph into a different school, either secular or something else, if most of its professors reject Catholic teachings? . . .

Later, after defending religious schools that seek to preserve their religious identity, he has some criticism for Hochschild, and for those who criticized Wheaton for its decision to fire him:

In 1994, while still a Yale undergraduate, Professor Hochschild wrote an elegant and perceptive article for The Yale Free Press entitled "Corpus Yalensis," in which he portrayed Yale as little more than a corpse, with its buildings bereft of its mission. "She is destroyed," Hochschild lamented, "her spirit separated from her body. Those who remember her life are left to wonder whether her spirit could survive the separation, and, if so immortal, whether the body will admit to resurrection."

If Hochschild concluded that Yale should be criticized for abandoning its ancient purpose, one might think that he would, despite losing his job over it, stand behind Wheaton for courageously affirming its commitment to its own founding principles. Unfortunately, Hochschild doesn't see it that way. He told Golden, "I see no reason why I should be dismissed from the College upon joining the Roman Catholic church." Not so long ago, he could think of one.