The Wheaton kerfuffle

I appreciate the posts by Rob, Mark, and Tom about the firing of Joshua Hochschild, a philosophy professor at Wheaton and a convert to Roman Catholicism (and a Notre Dame graduate).  My immediate reaction to the news was that the firing will likely increase the number (which, I gather, is significant) of engaged Wheaton students and graduates who explore, and join, the Catholic Church (or Orthodoxy). 

Also, like Tom, I was a bit confused by Hochschild's statement that "[t]he Bible ... is indeed the supreme authority for Catholics, who turn to the Church hierarchy only as Protestants consult their ministers."  I'm not a theologian, but I suspect that this statement is wrong.  In Dei verbum, for example, we're told that "Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture make up a single sacred deposit of the Word of God."  (Catechism, No. 97).  And, "[t]he task of giving authentic interpretation of the Word of God, whether in its written form or in the form of Tradition, has been entrusted to the living, teaching office of the Church alone."  (Catechism, No. 85).

On the question of Wheaton's religious distinctiveness and mission, I think Rob puts it well:

Shielding themselves from intellectual or spiritual pollution through unhelpful and outdated categorical Catholic-Protestant distinctions compromises Wheaton's mission.  But railing against religious discrimination in general does not facilitate a productive conversation on this issue, for I fully support institutions that take religious identity seriously.  A more prudent course is continued evangelical-Catholic engagement in an effort to show that for a school devoted to shaping followers of Christ in an academically rigorous environment, Joshua Hochschild is an asset, not a threat.

Now, just as I think the Supreme Court should not be in the business of telling the Boy Scouts what it really stands for, I suppose it's not my place to tell Wheaton what it's identity and mission really are.  Still, we do all love Jesus, so . . . it strikes me that Rob is right.

We have not talked much about this statement, in the Wall Street Journal piece:

But now a conservative reaction is setting in, part of a broader push against the secularization of American society. Fearful of forsaking their spiritual and educational moorings, colleges are increasingly "hiring for mission," as the catch phrase goes, even at the cost of eliminating more academically qualified candidates.

I cringed here, because, at Notre Dame, the myth that "hiring non-Catholics" is how we "hire for excellence," or that by hiring Catholics we sacrifice excellence, still has purchase in some quarters.  In fact -- as Brad Gregory (a great scholar) points out in the piece -- the opposite is true:

Administrators say that instead of reducing quality, Notre Dame's religious identity has lured some premier faculty, such as associate professor Brad Gregory, who left a tenured job at Stanford in 2003 for an equivalent, higher-paying position. "Notre Dame's Catholic character wasn't only a factor, it was the factor," says Mr. Gregory, a Catholic, who specializes in the history of Christianity. "By any ordinary measure, you'd be crazy to leave Stanford for Notre Dame."

Rick