The Obama Notre Dame Controversy

From your post I cannot discern whether you support the doctrines of the Catholic Church on the issues you specify or not. I am also adjusting my mind to think about the life of my girls and my own existence as an issue of biomedical justice instead of human life. Could you explain this further for this lay reader?

There are obviously different camps expressing their views. Why reject one side as divisive? Is the side you consider to not be divisive reaching out to embrace the concerns of those you consider divisive?

This is another post on this blog I characterize as staking out a false 'common ground' position. I just don't think you get there by staking out ground in opposition to the 'dividers.' We get there by staking out a common ground that is transcendent--able to embrace legitimate issues on both sides. If we can't stake out that kind of ground--we are just playing the same oppositional game.

This is an interesting article give the fact that Jim Wallis praised those protesting President Bush when he gave the commencement speech at Calvin College, My Ala Mater. His view was that the protests and petitions would ad to the dialogue.
I believe that it is an honor for a President to speak at any College or University. I hope is that President Obama will be welcomed warmly and he will not have to deal with the protesters that Bush had to deal with at Calvin which Jim Wallis welcomed.

"And President Obama, in an effort to avoid playing the partisan game, should be acknowledged by all for accepting an invitation to speak at a Catholic university where a large percentage of the student body comes from conservative backgrounds."

Are you serious?

"These "divisive" groups paint Democrats as vehemently opposed to life and family..." Not in this case. Just President Obama.

"several Web sites have appeared that militantly call for Notre Dame to rescind its invitation to the president. One such Web site, www.notredamescandal.com, invites its viewers to electronically sign and send a petition to Father John I. Jenkins, president of the university."

A petition is "militant?" That's a new characterization of an exercise of simple speech. If you are prepared to characterize other and all other petition efforts, for things like getting a minimum wage law on the ballot as "militant," fine.

"Notre Dame's attempt to engage with individuals who don't agree with the Catholic church's stance on the abortion"

Describe this "engagement." President Obama going to meet any speakers or groups who are opposed to his policies on abortion and using federal funds for embryonic stem cells?

"To begin finding common ground, both groups should realize that both social and biomedical justice, along with environmental justice, are essential to forming a more humane and sustainable global society. In other words..."

...Catholics and others opposed to abortion should accept the fact that they are outnumbered and settle for the reality that we will always have abortion among us.

"Commenting on this discrimination, Dr. Patrick Whelan of Harvard Medical School, in his book The Catholic Case for Obama, rightly observes that "By this standard, anyone who expressed public support for President Bush could be excluded at Communion, given Mr. Bush's support for torture and the Bishops' recent inclusion of torture (along with abortion) in their Faithful Citizenship document as an 'intrinsically evil act.'""

Yep, could happen. Probably should happen. Point?

Don't think for a second this is really about abortion or even Obama -- it's about an angry conservative populace who can't accept that someone whom it didn't choose has authority, so it will try to hamstring him any chance it gets. There's no comparison to President Bush, who thought of himself as an absolute ruler akin to God and ran this country off the rails in the process.

Abortion as a "bio-medical" issue?

Yeah, that just happened.

I really enjoyed reading this post. I agree that all issues are equally important. This reminds me of the seamless garment approach.

OFF TOPIC ALERT
Hey everyone--please take a moment and e-mail Giannii Calvert to let him know the comment section on this site is difficult to navigate. I've been conversing with him off and on, but he asked for others to do the same. He isn't seeing the problems we are.

giannii@disqus.com

Thanks

I wondered at the time what Wallis and Sojo would think of people protesting the appearance of any Democratic president at their graduation. They praised students at Calvin for protesting a president who pushed policies that went against their values. And now they're criticizing students for doing the same at Notre Dame? Predictable.

Obama is not just pro-choice. Listen to Alan Keyes

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6p3l8BXmhs

Maybe a Catholic University should reject an appearance by this man.

For once Squeaky I'm going to agree with you. I think the Disqus system of self-policing has a lot going for it, but once a conversation thread gets more than 10-15 comments the thing does get clumsy. Let's see if we can get them to fix some of the glitches. Let's do this for the sake of bipartisanship!

LV

Not only predictable, entertaining.

This from a man who filed suit in California to have Obama disqualified from the presidency on the flimsy grounds that he isn't really a U.S. citizen. Please.

There was more to that flap at Calvin than most people realize, however. It is my understanding that Calvin faculty and students don't toe the conservative line and also that a few conservatives on that campus wanted more power there -- which is how and why Bush was invited there. The entire episode was supposed to provoke a reaction.

One other thing I forgot: There were protests at a local Catholic college -- someone had joined Bush's cabinet whose name escapes me had been an administrator there -- a couple of years ago because he was slated to give a commencement address.

Calvin did not invite Bush. Bush requested to speak at commencement.

It is also my understanding that Notre Dame faculty and students don't toe the liberal line -- or at least not all of them. So what's your point? Are dissenters allowed to make their point or aren't they?

LV

Dissenters can say whatever they want.... I don't care. I'm not sure singing a petition accomplishes anything in this case. My point was that Sojo can't have it both ways. They can't support those who protested at Calvin and call it dialogue and then turn around and say those protesting Obama at ND are divisive.

There's a difference, however. When a "liberal" (broadly understood for our
purposes as anyone who is not a doctrinaire conservative, though the label may
not always fit exactly, which is why I put it in quotes) protests a
conservative, almost always it's due to some specific action that the
conservative has done. When a conservative protests a liberal, on the other
hand, almost always it's due to the fact that he/she is not a conservative.
That explains why you had conservatives out to get Obama from the time he won
the nomination and many still cannot accept that he's the president, while
anti-Bush sentiment was not galvanized until the war in Iraq -- at least
Bush's critics have him a chance.

More assigning of motives and mind reading. Like I wrote earlier, predictable and entertaining.

Spoken like someone who knows neither the history of the conservative movement nor how it operates.

Your hypocrisy is almost as stunning as your ability to read minds and know the hearts of men.

Neither charge is true -- their own words convict them. And the way you
respond to me convicts you.

Keep believing that if it makes you fell superior.

Superiority has nothing to do with it -- it's all about truth.