Nuance: A reply to Rob

Responding quickly to Rob's latest:  I agree (and long have agreed) with Sr. Prejean that Texas's clemency-and-commutation procedures are a farce.  Certainly, then-Gov. Bush could have worked to reform (but just as certainly had no interest in reforming) these procedures.  Still, if we are asking for "nuance", context, etc., it seems to me that we should -- and Fr. McBrien did not -- take into account the role and actual power of the person in question.  The Governor of Texas, it seems to me, is not responsible for an execution in Texas in the same way that, say, President Obama is reponsible for the recent policy changes on embryo-destructive research.  (Again, just so there is no misunderstanding:  I oppose capital punishment, and think that a Catholic university that takes its Catholic character seriously would want to take a politician's views and record on that issue into account when deciding whether or not to honor that politician.)

I cannot speak for others, but I am pretty sure that in none of my various interventions on the matter have I said that a Catholic university could never honor a politician with pro-abortion-rights views (or, for that matter, pro-death-penalty views, which is not to say that these two issues are indistinguishable).  For me, what makes the Notre Dame invitation, on balance, regrettable is the timing, context, and social meaning of the honor (and also the extremely sad fact that Notre Dame is finding itself at odds with so many bishops), not the mere fact that President Obama is, in an abstract or theoretical sense, "pro-choice."  (I can't resist noting that, for me, his anti-choice stance on education reform would -- wholly and apart from the "life issues" -- make it hard for me to cheer, but that's another matter.)

Rob writes, "[t]here's a big difference between my decision in the voting booth and a university's decision on commencement, of course.  The university's decision carries the risk of causing scandal and confusion as to the Church's moral teaching.  But while that might change the particulars of the inquiry, it need not change the overall nature of the inquiry."  I'm not sure how exactly, or to what extent, it changes the nature of the inquiry, but I do think it does, and for the reasons Rob says.  The university "speaks", publicly, when it honors someone, and it is important to say the right thing (or, at least, not a wrong thing).  Given the timing of the President's acceptance, and the salience of abortion and stem-cell research, I think the university should not have taken the risks it did that by honoring the President, it would be seen as minimizing the seriousness of these issues.

Anyway . . . moving forward, it seems to me that Notre Dame -- to which I am perhaps excessively committed -- has, with this invitation, taken on the burden of making clear, with real actions, to the world that it is, in fact -- as Fr. Jenkins has several times said -- unwaveringly committed to the sanctity of life.  (Imagine what it would say if, at halftime during a football game, once of those "What would you fight for?" ads featured the work of one of the many Notre Dame students, faculty, or graduates working in the pro-life arena?)