Posted by
OnceAlwaysaMarine on Saturday, May 16, 2009 1:31:16 AM
Perhaps after Barack Hussein Obama takes his show to South Bend this weekend, Mr. Jenkins will consider a name change for the nation's premier Catholic University; from Notre Dame to Notre Damned.
Notre Dame was originally owned and directed by the Congregation of Holy Cross, whose motherhouse in the United States is located at Notre Dame, the name by which the university is most commonly known. However, the General Administration of THE CONGREGATION OF HOLY CROSS remains in Vatican City, Via Framura, 85 00168 Rome, Italy
The University of Notre Dame was founded by the Congregation of Holy Cross and in 1844 it was established as a civil moral person by a legislative act of the state of Indiana. On March 6, 1967, with the consent of the Holy Father Pope Paul VI, in the spirit of Vatican Council II with its clarion call for all Catholics to take greater responsibility for living and strengthening the life of the Church, the Congregation of Holy Cross ceded its ownership of the University of Notre Dame to a Board of Fellows. The University remains, however, under the continuous sponsorship of the Congregation of Holy Cross.
The change of ownership of the University of Notre Dame from the Congregation of Holy Cross took place in light of the Second Vatican Council's recommendation that competent laity play a more significant role in the administration of religious and ecclesiastical property.
Through this unprecedented gesture the Congregation of Holy Cross sought to offer competent lay Catholics broader responsibility for Catholic higher education without jeopardizing the authentic Catholic character of the institution.
On April 1, 2009, the Administrator of the Congregation of the Holy Cross wrote a letter from the Vatican which in part states:
"President Obama, your presence at Notre Dame, a premier Catholic institution, is regarded by many good Catholics as scandalous because of your support of abortion rights, regarded by us as an intrinsic evil. In awarding you this degree, they experience Notre Dame as undermining essential, intrinsic Catholic dogma which upholds the dignity of human life. They believe that in honoring you or in giving you a platform to speak, the University of Notre Dame is selling her soul for who knows what: perhaps, at best, for the prestige and glory of having the President of the United States on campus during his first year in office or perhaps at worst, giving an endorsement to your “anti-life policies.”
I do not believe this outrage is simply a demonstration of partisan politics. I sincerely want to rejoice in your presence at Notre Dame as President of the United States. But really, can I? In all sincerity, President Obama, how are we Catholics to deal with you, or any other government leader, who upholds what we believe to be the intrinsic evil of abortion and who is willing to sign the FOCA legislation? How are we to confront Catholic leaders in your own Administration by whom we feel so abandoned?"
Clear evidence that, although Mr. Jenkins (he’s not worthy to be called Father) does not have the support of higher ups in the Catholic hierarchy. Yet he feels compelled to bestow his University’s highest honors on a man who not only has none of the “empathy” for unborn (or inconveniently born) children that he claims to value in a Supreme Court justice nominee; but one who when speaking at another revered Catholic University (Georgetown) required Georgetown to cover a monogram symbolizing Jesus' name in Gaston Hall, which Obama used for his speech. I wonder if Mr. Jenkins will be required to cover the image of “Touchdown Jesus” that sits behind the Notre Dame goalposts.
‘When Government outlaws God, Government becomes God.’
Jenkins has said Notre Dame does not support Obama's positions on issues regarding the protection of human life but that his appearance provides "a basis for further positive engagement." Has there been some previous “positive engagement” about Barack Hussein Obama’s views on the right to life of unborn children that everyone else is unaware of. Perhaps to “provide “a basis for further positive engagement of their own, the “progressive” University of Chicago and William Ayers will extend an invitation to Dick Cheney or George W. Bush to speak at their next year’s commencement address.
Some idiot on another TH thread related to this story even had the audacity to claim that the protestations against Obama speaking were meaningless since, “Notre Dame left the Roman Catholic Church in 1966.”
A bold-faced lie.
Notre Dame did not leave the Roman Catholic Church in 1966, or ever. The University of Notre Dame Board of Trustees continues to hold its annual winter meetings each year in Rome.
This is an excerpt from a letter written by Holy Cross Priests to Notre Dame on April 10, 2009:
http://www.cdobs.com/archive/featured/holy-cross-priests-ob ject-to-notre-dame-honor-of-obama,11181
Holy Cross Priests Object to Notre Dame Honor of Obama
Wilson D. Miscamble C.S.C 10 April 2009
"We write as priests of the Congregation of Holy Cross and as proud graduates of the University of Notre Dame to voice our objection to the University’s decision to honor President Barack Obama by inviting him to deliver this year’s Commencement address and by conferring on him an honorary Doctor of Laws degree.
We wish to associate ourselves with and encourage those courageous students and treasured alumni who, while deeply loving Notre Dame, vigorously oppose this sad and regrettable decision of the University administration.
It is our deep conviction that Notre Dame should lead by word and deed in upholding the Church’s fundamental teaching that human life must be respected and protected from the moment of conception. In so doing the University must take seriously the 2004 instruction of the U.S. Catholic Bishops that “Catholic institutions should not honor those who act in defiance of our fundamental moral principles. They should not be given awards, honors, or platforms which would suggest support for their actions.”
Surely, for Notre Dame to honor THIS president when he symbolizes the most horrendous abortion procedures that not only kill children in the womb, but would also have made it a legal REQUIREMENT for hospitals and doctors to withhold treatment from those infants having SURVIVED a failed abortion attempt is unconscionable.
Perhaps, after this sorry affair, and as a result of Mr. Jenkins' intransigence in retracted this damnable and detestable invitation to bestow one of Catholic Notre Dame's highest honors on the president of "Goddamn America" and the most heinour and evil methods of abortion, perhaps he ought also consider changing the name of his University to commemorate the event, from Notre Dame to Notre Damned.