Professor Garnett on Obama and Notre Dame
May 12, 2009
Professor Richard Garnett of the Univeristy of Notre Dame Law School was interviewed on NPR on the Obama and Notre Dame controversy. He provides some very measured thoughts that I find helpful in thinking clearly about this issue.
Advertisement
15 Comments
Comments are closed.
Is an invitation to be a commencement speaker, in an of itself, an honor? And if not, would Notre Dame be off the hook if it had invited Obama to make the commencement address without including an honorary degree as part of the deal? Or could Notre Dame have diffused the controversy early on by deciding not to give the honorary degree? I know that is the position of some here, but I believe we would still have had pretty much the same protest if the honorary degree had not been offered or had been withdrawn.
Nevertheless, I did appreciate Professor Garnett’s thoughtful comments.
Some good thoughts, for sure, but I think his defense of ND honoring Bush was a bit silly (“at the time he was really into the faith based initiative thing which was appealing to ND”).
I would add that saying it would be acceptable to invite Obama to debate a faculty member struck me as odd. Certainly it can be argued that it would not break the “rules” laid down by the bishops, but if Obama were to debate, say, a theologian or a professor of ethics at Notre Dame, why not have him debate professors of economics, international relations, military science, and so on, at other universities?
I think it was John Kerry who said to a bishop something along the lines of, “You have a position, but I have to have a policy.” Taking the religious and intellectual position that life begins at conception doesn’t automatically create a policy of what to do about it. And we may largely elect presidents on their positions, but when they get into office, they have to do something political and practical about their positions. We don’t expect our presidents to be experts in every field (and the ones who attempt to be are called “wonks”). We expect them to lead.
I would add that saying it would be acceptable to invite Obama to debate a faculty member struck me as odd.
I would pay significant amounts of money to watch Obama debate Alasdair MacIntyre. It would be very entertaining.
This is where I say emphatically that we don’t want to live under philospher kings. The theoretical should inform the practical and the practical should inform the theoretical, but there should be a firm seperation between the two. That’s the long way of saying a debate between MacIntyre and Obama would be uninformative and ultimately boring.
It would be fun, at any rate, to see MacIntyre deny Obama’s (and much of the audience’s) first premise: that there is the possibility for justice at all within a liberal democratic nation-state such as the U.S.
M.Z.: What is the “theoretical” and the “practical”? Where does one end and the other begin or vice-versa?
I suppose political philosophy causes some issues here. lol. The breaking down of lines is kind of engrained now.
I hate to give this answer, but it is like the difference between art and “centerfolds.” As one chap put it, you know it when you see it. Analogously, physics and engineering enjoy a similar split.
I must be completely blind then, seriously. In education it is huge deal—we have entire journals dedicated to putting “theory into practice”—but I can’t for the life of me see the difference. But that just might be my problem…
You are responding to the incentives put forth. I regret to say this is about the level of depth I can speak on this though. What I do know is that this has been pushed for at least a decade now under the guise of interdisciplinary research.
Amen. That much I can see and agree with you on wholeheartedly. But it forces my phenomenological sentiment to question the things themselves and that’s where I get totally lost.
I now have a better understanding of the extremists on this matter. The professor is absolutely polite and civil and respectful. The problem is without the hysterical rhetoric, it becomes even more clear what a weak case there is for opposing the President.
He said “nobody would have a problem with a speech” without the degree. We know that is false. The internet is loaded with right wingers dencouncing the President speaking.
The suggestion of a debate was truly strange. It suggests how out of touch Notre Dame’s opponents are. Except to the fanatics, it is clear that the President has no interest in being a leading spokesperson for the pro-choice position. The President’s opponents had to go back to 2007 to find him speaking in detail on the issue (which they then endless re-broadcast). Why would the President raise his involvement in the pro-choice movement to the level of being their representative in a debate? And why would a pro-lifer want him to except to justify hating him even more?
The Professor then notes that Bush’s anti-life positions wre okay because they were not ‘flagship’ issues for him. It is only the Catholic Right that endlessly talks about the President and abortion. Abortion is hardly a flagship issue to President Obama.
The Professor then says the invitiation is not objectively wrong, and that the university could in good conscience invite a pro-choice person in public life, but the issue is one of message, context and timing. So be it, but these are very subjective things and matters of judgment. Without doubt, it is a judgment the University has the right to make. The disrepect shown to Notre Dame cannot be justified based on a matter of judgment that is rightfully theirs.
“The problem is without the hysterical rhetoric, it becomes even more clear what a weak case there is for opposing the President.”
Bingo!
It seems to me that this young Notre Dame graduate, living out his commitment to the “sanctity of life” by working as a Maryknoll Volunteer with his wife and children in Bolivia, is a far more effective “teacher” of “Catholic values” than the bishops and the right-wing Catholics caterwauling on this site and in other places about the President’s commencement speeches at Notre Dame.
And, as Rocco Palma points out today, he actually DID something about the monstrous former President’s appearance on a dais at Notre Dame, in order to trick American Catholics into believing into his solidarity with them regarding “life issues”—even after he had amassed a record as the biggest legalized murderer in Texas history and one who had actually MOCKED the Catholic clergy who appealed against his death warrants (and had treated even John Paul II’s appeal peremptorily):
Some Catholics view abortion as the central tenet of their faith, adding now the issue of fetal stem-cell research, Moriarty said. “They are able to disregard the (Iraq) war as debatable, and the death penalty as debatable,” he said.
They simplify the issue by stating abortion is wrong, and the simple solution is to criminalize it, he said.
“I feel really strongly that abortion is a tragedy. It’s horrific to look at the numbers,” he said.
But many people who call themselves pro-life are just anti-abortion, said Moriarty, who said he doesn’t see many such advocates actively working to improve the lives of poor mothers and their children.
“The (Catholic) Church needs to stop looking to the state to enforce church teachings and focus instead on living out those teachings as a community of disciples,” he said. “If the Catholic Church were half the size it is but twice as faithful to its own teaching, it would have a lot bigger impact than trying to lobby the world.”
Moriarty said he’s encouraged that some Democrats have started to move away from the pro-choice camp and focus on ways to reduce the number of abortions…
Moriarty said he believes Obama’s social policies designed to help poor people could do more to reduce the number of abortions than pro-life group efforts.
…In his 2001 Notre Dame speech, Bush unveiled his program of faith-based initiatives. Moriarty saw it as the president courting Catholic support, and the university handing itself over to be used for political goals. Something similar might come of Obama’s speech, Moriarty said.
Moriarty said that when he chose to kneel and pray at the 2001 commencement, he purposely chose a protest that would not interrupt the ceremony for other graduates. He hopes nothing happens on May 17 to mar the event.
“The people who need to be respected the most are the graduates,” he said. “It’s a way to honor them for their achievements.”
http://www.southbendtribune.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090510/News01/905100345/1130
Since the Eucharist is the foundation of our faith it would then seem to me that there can be no limits of experience that can prevent the expression of Christ in us. I have not seen written nor heard from anyone that opposes or supports Obama receiving an honorary award mention anything about the possibility that ND’s invitation to him could be associated with the mystery of the Eucharist working through Fr. Jenkins as expression of Christ’s desire that we “…all may be one…” as He and His Father are one.
The Eucharist is a communion that draws us together in love through God’s gift of Love to us.
The world watched and people of color reacted with joy and renewed hope when Obama was elected president. ND is seen as the largest and most influential Catholic educational institution in the US. What do we gain opposing the openness being expressed in Obama’s invitation? What does the world see in this opposition?
Is the mystery of the Eucharist involved in this experience?