Luceat!

The National Catholic Register has an exciting article (here) on the “Renaissance of Catholic higher ed”. It brought me back to an article (here) by Fr. Neuhaus in the April 2007 edition of First Things called, “A Particular University.”

Concerning a ‘university’ Fr. Neuhaus explains that an institution with university in their title has done nothing to define itself because the termuniversity is not self-explanatory. Rather, “every university is, whether by careful deliberation or by accident, a university of a particular kind.” To be a secular school is to choose to be one particular kind, while to be a Christian school is to be of another kind. Furthermore, too often in our culture, whether it is in the media, politics or education, secular is taken to be synonymous with neutral. This assertion needs to be questioned. Especially by college students who are faced with the unenviable task of listening to their ‘neutral’ professors day in and day out. When a teacher walks in a room, a reporter sits down to a computer, or a judge steps into a courthouse, they are all coming to work with a certain mindset that is anything but neutral.

His article moves along to take a look at Christian universities in particular. Fr. Neuhaus explains that,

“Institutions have souls that reflect the souls of those who brought them into being with a definite intention and reflect the souls of those who keep faith with, and build upon, that intention…A university born ex corde ecclesiae - from the heart of the Church - must decide, and then again decide every day, whether or not to keep faith with the Church of Jesus Christ.”

Years ago many Catholic schools changed their mission and now describe themselves as schools, “in the Catholic tradition.” Later in the article Fr. Neuhaus cites a student who says,”when a school is haggling over its mission statement, it is a sure sign it has already lost its way.” And finally this,

“Let me put it bluntly: A student at a Christian university who has not encountered the proposal of the Christian intellectual tradition-from Paul to Augustine, from Irenaeus to Dante, Aquinas, Luther, Milton, and moderns such as Lewis and Polanyi, along with those who have challenged and now challenge that tradition-such a student has been grievously shortchanged in his or her university education.”

It is here that the article from National Catholic Register speaks loudly. For at least the past 30 years more and more students at Catholic institutions have been “grievously shortchanged” by their education. Schools that were once bright shining lights have put themselves under a bushel. A few Catholic institutions have carried the torch during this dim time in Catholic higher education. But as the National Catholic Register reports, there are new Catholic schools popping up around the country, along with revival of some others. (The article mentions Belmont Abbey College, I will also mention Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas)
These new institutions, in union with the first universities of the Middle Ages, are ex corde ecclesiae, from the heart of the Church. Though they each have different means, (see John Paul the Great University and Wyoming Catholic College), their end is the pursuit and spreading of truth. Derry Connelly, president of John Paul the Great University is quoted by NC Register: “Pope John Paul II said that the only reason a Catholic institution exists is to evangelize.”

It is the sole purpose of the Church on Earth, the Church Militant, to evangelize. It inspiring to see that a great a weapon “against the world rulers of this present darkness” will be put back into commission through a university of a particular kind. A Catholic kind.

May God bless them! St. Thomas Aquinas…Pray for us!