on 11/9/99 11:12 AM, [EMAIL PROTECTED] at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> An interesting essay related to a topic of periodic interest to some members
> of the list in the context of teaching or otherwise:
> (Geez, did I get in all the proper qualifiers ?)
Gee, is it time to resume that debate already?
As long as Sandra has raised the issue, I'd like to pose a question to
colleagues at other Catholic colleges & universities (though others are
certainly welcome to join in) which goes relates to the science & religion
issue: Has there been much discussion about the Ex Corde Ecclesiae debate on
your campuses? Has it had any impact on activities on your campus? (no
qualifiers--I hope the relevance to teaching will be obvious)
For those who are unfamiliar with it, Ex Corde Ecclesiae was written by the
pope back in 1990. It's long (and even vague), but the gist of it seems to
be that Catholic colleges & universities should be accountable to the church
for their activities. (A web search will find the full text, as well as
various reactions.) The catholic bishops drafted a plan for achieving this
(passed nearly unanimously), but that plan itself was criticized by
presidents of colleges (e.g., Monk Malloy at Notre Dame). And I believe the
Vatican was not satisified with it, anyway. Here's an excerpt from
http://www.udayton.edu/news/nr/020299.html that quickly summarizes some of
the key disagreements:
"Ex Corde Ecclesiae, the 1990 Vatican document on Catholic higher education,
calls for bishops to have control of the 236 American Catholic colleges and
universities rather than lay boards of trustees in an effort to preserve
Catholic higher education in an age of dwindling numbers of vowed religious.
The version of the document proposed by the U.S. Conference of Catholic
Bishops in November also calls for schools to have a majority of faithful
Catholics serving on boards and faculties and for theology professors to
receive mandates from local bishops.
The document raises questions of academic freedom, availability of federal
aid and separation of church and state for Catholic colleges and
universities in the United States. A final vote on the document may come
toward the end of the year."
The debate has had some impact already on us: the local bishop is now on our
board of directors. Opinions here among the lay faculty range from "the pope
can't be serious!" to "how soon will I be asked to sign that statement of
acceptance of Catholic doctrine?" Prevalent opinion here seems to be that
there would be little impact on the day-to-day activities of faculty, but
there is also some under-current of concern as to where this may take us.
Anyone else seeing any impact from this?
John
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John Serafin
Professor of Psychology
Saint Vincent College
300 Fraser Purchase Rd.
Latrobe, PA 15650
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
