Totally unrelated to anything, but I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to point out this gem about Ave Maria Law (Mirror of Justice: Crisis at Ave Maria Law). Of course this is what happens when you mix fundamentalist religion (any religion) and the law. What did these profs. think would happen when they opted to work for school based on an authoritarian, patriarchal, and particularly dogmatic religious sect? That they would care at all what the profs. thought? Of course not. The people founding and funding the school have an agenda that includes using the law as a means to produce desired religious ends, and not to further free academic thought.
The school’s benefactor, Thomas Monaghan, has funded a number of projects intent on changing or shaping political debate and influencing policy to follow his subjective brand of ultra-orthodox Catholicism. The town he founded, Ava Maria, is a sanctuary for orthodox Catholics and in the town you will find no porn, no condoms or other birth control, and only carefully controlled clean television. This is the man behind your school. You bought into the type of law school this man wanted, which is led by the dean chosen to carry out his vision. If you have any problem drinking the kool-aid, then start packing. If you follow the man’s money, you will find that he has attempted to influence American elections through donations, 2 PACS he ran, and donations to other PACS. I am an atheist, and even I recognize the danger to society that his brand of pre-Vatican II Catholicism poses. He pushes a very anti-intellectual, anti-freedom brand of natural law theocracy. Even from Arkansas I could see that Ava Maria law school was an attempt to develop lawyers, judges, and politicos who would influence American jurisprudence. (see, i.e., this NPR story)
The real crime here is that the academics at Ave Maria were so blinded by [insert individual motivation here], that they helped the school get ABA accreditation. C’mon, Justice Antonin Scalia helped draft the law school’s curriculum, Monaghan dumped $50 mil. into the school, Justice Thomas and Robert H. Bork have been teaching classes there, the board includes Archbishop Chaput, the founder of Ignatius Press; etc. I have even read that Opus Dei is recruiting among the student body. So, again, what were you expecting when you signed on to teach at Ave Maria?
Again, here is the story that triggered this rant: Mirror of Justice: Crisis at Ave Maria Law and my favorite quote.
To summarize: last spring, a substantial majority of the faculty issued a vote of “no confidence” in Dean Bernard Dobranski. The response from the AMSL Board of Governors, led by Board Chairman and AMSL’s largest funder, Thomas Monaghan, was a terse restatement of its support for the Dean. This rejection of open discussions, combined with retaliatory actions by the Dean, exclusion of the faculty from governance of the school, and serious violations of academic freedom were subjects of an investigation by an ABA fact-finder earlier this year. In the midst of this ABAprocess, the AMSL Board voted in effect to close AMSL and transfer its assets to a new law school to be located on the campus of Ave Maria University, in southwest Florida.
Filed under: Legal Academics, Unrelated
You know, that patriarchal & authoritarian religion is the reason Universities exist at all…
I am astounded by your ignorance and misinformation. As an atheist, you have drunk the cool-aid of pop culture.
What are the ingredients of a Big Mac?
Why does the scientific method work toward understanding an external truth?
Are we “brainwashed religious patriarchal bigots” still allowed the freedom to live? Or are you planning how to reduce our numbers by placing us in prison or just humanely putting us to sleep?
Perhaps you should read a little bit about something before you make yourself look so silly. Try reading “Theology of the Body” for starters. Catholics believe in respecting the environment. We also believe in respecting women by not brainwashing them into thinking they aren’t good enough… that they need to sterilize themselves with pills or surgery and act more like men.
Anti-Catholicism – the last acceptable prejudice.
Please disregard the last post. As a fellow atheist and an AMSOL student, I have the misfortune of having to deal with plenty of students at Ave like this last poster. However, many students are just regular people trying to get a good legal education (like myself).
I went to Ave because I really could not afford to go anywhere else (living with family rent-free meant I could get a legal education I could afford). Even though I disagree with my professors on many things (birth control, abortion, gay marriage, unions, capitalism, religion, etc.), they have provided me with a great legal education – which is what I paid for. I would NEVER compare them to Tom Monaghan – who would probably expel me for not buying into his “Catholicism Wow!” agenda. The majority of the professors I’ve had encouraged debate (Bork – not so much), and except for a hostile encounter with Charlie Rice on my first day, I’ve always felt welcome at the school. The professors at Ave really care about their students, and they are always willing to help students with school, life, careers, etc.
The founding faculty members created the concept of the school – they went to Monaghan to get the funding. Although I would agree with you that they founded the school based on their desire to have a “truly Catholic school,” I would definitely disagree with you that their intention was “not to further free academic thought.”
I find it amusing that the majority of faculty, students, and alumni find the concept of Ave Maria Town as ridiculous as I do. I’m pretty sure that Monaghan backed down from his comments about the porn/birth control/condoms/etc. being “banned” from the town – since the ACLU threatened lawsuits.
Cheers!
Mr. Henning,
If we are to live in a world of various religious beliefs (and atheistic faith such as yours) and live in peace, it is imparative that we all aquire a certain level of religious literacy. I affirm your desire for freedom, intellectual inquiry and openness of discovery. These are values that we share.
Please permit me to comment on some of the misconceptions evident in your post.
1. Catholicism is not a “fundamentalist religion.” The term “fundamentalist” emerged out of Protestantism in regard to Christians who take a literal approach to interpreting scripture (Catholics approach is much more sophisticated and layered).
The term then was applied to Islamist extremists in relation to the Koran – but even this application is inappropriate because Muslims are not taught to “interpret” they are taught to memorize the Koran. In our era of dogmatic relativism, anyone who asserts the objectivity of truth gets labeled a fundamentalist (which I think is why you have applied the term to Catholicism).
2. There is a difference between legitimate authority and authoritarianism. Ever since the 1960′s our culture thinks that all authority is illegitimate. As a father, I have authority over my children and they need me to exercise that authority with love. My authority is not absolute, it has limits. If I didn’t recognize those limits I would be an authoritarian. The Catholic Church has legitimate authority to determine what is the content of the Catholic Faith and Catholic Morals, and She proposes that truth to the world. She doesn’t have the authority to determine the best political party, or the best economic and fiscal policy. She knows her limits. Just as the Dali Lama has the authority to say what is Buddhist teaching and what isn’t, so too the Catholic Church has the legitimate authority to say what is an isn’t Catholic belief. This isn’t authoritarianism, it is legitimate authority.
3. Yes, the Catholic Church is patriarchial, but not in the sense that you are using that word. Much of the Catholic Faith is based on the idea of the goodness of Fatherhood, not over the goodness of Motherhood, but in service to Motherhood. Ideological feminism has demonized the idea of patriarchy as necessarily a system of opression (this idea is about 40 years old and was shaped by Marxist critical theory). However, an objective look at how women have advanced in society will reveal that it is within a very specific context that women have advanced to where they are today. That context is Judeo-Christian – specifically Catholic. A brief poof: ask yourself how women are treated in the Islamic world, or India, or China? Then ask yourself how women are treated in atheistic secular cultures like our own and those in Europe – these are cultures where the sex industry has flourished. Just look at what Catholicism teaches about women (not what the History Channel teaches that the Catholic Church teaches, but what the Church actually teaches), you might be surprised by what you discover.
4. Catholicism invented the university, it invented the idea of academic freedom, and it invented the idea of tolerance.
5. I would remind you that our Constitution is based on Natural Law, it is what our Founding Fathers took for granted. Only within the last 100 years or so have we seen the development of an alternative legal theory – legal positivism. It basically comes down to one or the other (and the various flavors under each). Either Justice is an objective standard, or it is the determination of the elite and powerful. The Nazi’s thought it was the latter, at Nuremburg and in Bermingham Jail the Natural Law was upheld. Theocracy is rule by clerics. Catholicism explicity teaches against this. Again, in today’s climate of dogmatic relativism, anyone who asserts a moral basis for governance (that doesn’t square with the politically correct agenda) is labled a theocrat – this is simply an attempt at slander. Every law has a moral basis, the only question is whether it is a legitimate or illegitimate moral basis.
Ave Maria School of Law (AMSoL) received its accredidation at the very first opportunity because the ABA were so impressed with what they found. The ABA inspectors said that AMSoL was MORE classically liberal – meaning it supported more of an open and tolerant debate – than what could be found in law schools across the country infected by politically correct sacred cows which must be worshiped. The ABA (not known for their conservative views) were impressed by the depth of scholarship brought to bear on debates in the classroom and the genuine civility they witnesses between people of differing views.
Also, Tom Monaghan didn’t found the school. It was five professors who left their secure jobs, designed the school, pledged their own savings and went to the Ave Maria Foundation for start-up funding for a limited time (9 years). The law school is an independent non-profit, not a sole proprietorship, and the ABA granted accredidation on the plan that AMSoL would be financially independent by 2009.
The current problem at AMSoL is that Tom Monaghan has coopted the Board of Governors, violated the law and violated the mission of the school in forcing decisions that are not in the best interest of the school. This has nothing to do with his Catholic Faith.
In fact, Monaghan is behaving contrary to the Catholic Church’s explicit teaching on the governance, vision and ethos of Catholic higher education.
Perhaps the problem rests in the fact that Mr. Monaghan is a graduate of the school of hard knocks, but has never finished formal education. What has worked to sell pizzas does not translate to running educational communities.
I hope that I have shed some light on this subject for you Mr. Henning. Please take some time to learn more about Catholicism, infact I invite you to do your best to refute its claims.
It has been said that the faith of the atheist is irrational and contradictory, where as the faith in God is not only rational but the source of all sanity.
“The school’s benefactor, Thomas Monaghan, has funded a number of projects intent on changing or shaping political debate and influencing policy to follow his subjective brand of ultra-orthodox Catholicism.”
The question is not about Mr. Monaghan’s orthodoxy — all the professors are Orthodox (and, I dare say, none of them “fundementalist”) — the question, rather, is about Mr. Monaghan’s dubious vision and his methods for obtaining it.
The founding faculty had a vision. They sought some financial help from someone perceived at the time as a friend of Catholic endeavors. Remember that this is coming right around the time of John Paul II’s encyclical Fides et Ratio and about a decade after Ex Corde Ecclesiae. Those two documents generated a palpable air of excement in the Catholic community. It was percieved again that Catholics could enter into culture help enrich and transform it from the inside.
It was this exciting vision of the integrity between faith and reason which was to be incarnate in such institutions as AMSoL. The concept of the university was, after all, a Catholic one to begin with, and Catholics have throughout the history of university made invaluable contributions to it. Catholics around around the turn of Millenium were excited to build something that would enable them to once again make valuable contribitutions.
How much Mr. Monaghan shared the vision of the founding faculty is purely academic at this point. Even if he did share it at one point, his vision for the law school got interwined with his vision for his Catholic Eutopia (or, perhaps “utopia” would be more accurate). Everything was to be the biggest and the best: the biggest oratory in the US, the biggest football stadium, NCAA Division I, a protected environment where women would not be exploited through the pornographic industry, etc.
THIS BECAME THE PRIMARY VISION OF MR. MONAGHAN, and the SoL was unfortunate enough to become subsumed under it. He broke all sorts of promises in manipulated to Board of Governers to move the Law School down. He changed the nature of the game after the SoL had already been established.
This is not a question about Orthodoxy, this is a question about vision, and most importantly about who controls Ave Maria School of Law and what is in its best interest.
Objectivist,
Of course I don’t think it’s *good* per se that you don’t believe the Catholic faith or in Jesus. The name I use (and I use this everywhere I post on the internet) rather gives away what I stand.
Yet you are percisely the type of person that the professors would want, a reasonable and intelligent individual who recognizes that one can oftentimes learn more by debating with one’s adversaries than consorting with one’s friends. I’m glad that you shared your experiences. They are very enlightening and go far to break this portrayel of Catholics as so fringe that they are beyond the rhelm of reasonable discourse. Thank you.
P.S., Mr. Monaghan did back down from his porn/contraceptive statements. Not that I would shed any tears if either were made illegal — especially pornagraphy which I think leads directly to the exploitation of women, but one cannot impose an external constitution on a people of a resolutely different mindset. Tom Monaghan should never have suggested that because of the current makeup of the United States and legal status.
In a country where Catholic Hospitals can be given the option to sell contraceptives or shut down, he should have known better than to think he could keep them out of a whole city.
Objectivist,
Thank you for your comment. Unfortunately, most atheists have little or no experience with Catholics or Catholicism. My guess is that Mr. Henning has a caricature of Catholicism that has been formed mainly by a mass media that hates Catholicism for good reason – Catholicism makes truth claims and the Media arrogate that right only to themselves (they don’t like competition).
Your post is honest and expresses your honest experience engaging with Catholics and other people of Faith who disagree with many of your foundational beliefs. But they do so with civility and with intellectual rigor, as your experience shows.
On the other hand, when I went to a secular Law School for my first year, I found the intolerance and opressive climate of secular athiests stifling and abusive. Those in authority were objectively authoritarian and in fact abused their position to force an ideological group think on the students. It was shameful.
The difference between Catholics and secular atheists is that Catholics have a supernatural “check” on their behavior, secular atheists don’t. In my experience this translates into a lack of natural limits on the secular atheist in pursuing their ideological aims.
Perhaps this is why secular atheistics ideologies are responsible for the slaughter of hundreds of millions of people in the last century alone. Scholars say that more people were slaughtered in the last century than all the wars around the globe added together since the dawn of recorded history.
There is not one instance in the modern era (when atheism became an official philosophical view) where Catholics have organized the targeted slaughter of secular atheists. However, in nearly EVERY secular atheistic regime that has come to power – Catholics have been targeted and slaughtered.
And that continues to this day.
Unfortunately, Mr. Henning expresses quite well the (uninformed) demonizing irrational opinions about Catholics which if given an opportunity will strikeout in violence against me and my family.
That fact alone is worth reconsidering the Objectivist philosohical system.
I hope that you would be open to examining the hidden assumptions of that world view with your peers at Ave Maria School of Law.
Mr. Henning:
What is the matter with influencing American jurisprudence? If Catholics shouldn’t do it, should anyone else?
Wow, of all the things I write about here, that this one would generate this number of comments is in itself interesting.
A few things.
1. You will find that most secular humanists and atheists actually are better informed about religion than most of the population. That is how their come to their beliefs. From a philosophical standpoint I am a logical positivist.
2. I understand that the faculty vision and the vision of the benefactor are different, but the benefactor’s mission has been plainly known for more than a decade. I have no problems with religious schools per se; Catholic University D.C. is a terrific school, I have no complaints with Notre Dame, Soka University is a breath of fresh air, I just applied to the LLM program in IP law at Yeshiva Univ. Cardozo School of Law, etc. The new styled religious schools, and in particular law schools–Ave Maria and Regent University–are a different type of creature all together. These are the ones I have an issue with. Again: Brigham Young, great. Bob Jones University, not so great.
3. I married a Catholic girl who went to parochial schools until college. My life mentor, and one of my best friends, is a gentle Catholic man 45 years my sr. who sits on the the board of Catholic charities and is very involved in the local Diocese. For nearly 15 years I have been in awe of this great man of enormous faith who rises every morning to attend mass before beginning his day. He is the one who convinced me to go back to school and become an attorney.
“My life mentor, and one of my best friends, is a gentle Catholic man 45 years my sr. who sits on the the board of catholic charties and is very involved in the local Diocese. For nearly 15 years I have been in awe of this great man of enormous faith who rises every morning to attend mass before beginning his day. He is the one who convinced me to go back to school and become an attorney.”
Mr. Henning,
The statements made about your misunderstanding of Catholicism are captured by the contradiction of the upper and lower quotes. If Catholicism is what you write about below, then blame your friend written about above who feeds on the Eucharist (see definition here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eucharist#Roman_Catholic_Church) each morning and lives a life of service.
“What did these profs. think would happen when they opted to work for school based on an authoritarian, patriarchal, and particularly dogmatic religious sect?”
At Ave Maria School of Law, our chapel is right next to our library. Mass occurs three times each day, but NONE are forced to attend.
Additionally, when you survey legal history, note the gap between ancient Roman Law and Common Law. We don’t erase those thirteen hundred years at Ave Maria. Perhaps one day your life mentor and your well developed reason will lead you to more seriously consider Catholicism.
I am a logical positivist.
I didn’t know there was such a thing. ;)
better informed about religion
That depends on what you mean by “religion.” For instance, most atheists who are old friends will rattle on about the Inquisition and the corruption of the Italian Popes, and maybe even about psychological constructs to dispel the fear of death, but few can explain why it makes sense philosophically to rule out one subset of data (religious experience) in favor of another (empirical experimentation), or why God would allow suffering, etc. Point being, the atheists I count among my friends are often as guilty of rejecting religion without a due hearing as the orthodox friends are of rejecting empiricism.
[...] re the chaos and scandal of administrative decisions being made in the AMU/AMSoL universe, this comment from columcille of fumare was exceptionally (imho) well done indeed. it takes time to unravel and [...]
While everyone might be interested in this story, frankly I am not. I care deeply about academic freedom, but not the religious argument underpinning this post. Yes, it bothers me that I live in a state where the constitution says I cannot hold office or testify in court (Ark. Const. Art XIX, Sec. 1), and that people who could care less about religion are not represented at the federal level. In a 2007 Gallup poll, 3% of the nation identified as Atheist, so there should be 16 or so of the 535 members of Congress by proportion. Actual representation = 0. I am aware that it is perfectly acceptable in our society for people to name call and deride atheists. It is a problem for me that “under god” is in the pledge of Allegience, because I love my country greatly, but still, there it is… All the heartache and pain that this belief causes in my life I am willing to put up with, because it is not worth fighting over. I believe in leading by example, and issues like civil rights, justice, and honor matter to me on a daily basis more than this ever will.
So, I am happy to leave this post up and everyone can continue the discussion elsewhere. I am getting back to what really moves my mental gears these days (and the purpose of the site), copyright law.
And thanks for stopping by.
Mr. Henning,
Certainly you would feel much more at home in Paris. Atheists are a much larger segment of the population there, because they cut off the heads of all the Catholic Clergy years ago. Perhaps the horror of the French Revolution is why your state will not allow you to hold office or testify. Besides, testifying “under oath” requires a committment to an external, transcendent truth. To an Atheist, that external truth might as well be the stay puff marshmellow man.
Enlightened,
I am sure that you derive a great sense of well being with your work with Crisis Ministries there in Charleston, SC. However, if you look at what you wrote you will see how easy it was for you to be biggoted and discriminatory against someone who only “thinks” different than you. If socially acceptable, how quickly would you rush to discriminate against someone who had a different skin color. Hopefully, with some reflection, you will see why people like myself not only feel persecuted, but actually fear people such as yourself. Please learn to live a bit of the love that your saviour taught.
As far as the “oath” is concerned. In the Antithesis of the Law, Christ taught that you should uphold a high standard of truthfulness at all times. (“I say to you: Swear not at all”). So, a true Christian would not take an oath, nor would they need one.
Mr. Kenning,
First, I do not live in Charleston, SC and have never been involved in Crisis Ministries.
Second, I was responding to your bigoted reference to Catholicism as a “authoritarian, patriarchal, and particularly dogmatic religious sect.”
Your attempt to tie issues of race to atheism, a philosophy which has been responsible for the blood of millions of Christians, truly boggles the mind. Are you not aware that lowly Christians were largely the instigators of freedom for all races and racial equality? Remember the REV. Martin Luther King?
Your characterization of oaths is a mischaracterization Christian belief. In fact, you have done what many who have abused Christians have done throughout the centuries, that is to take something out of context. Theophilus of Antioch discusses the separation of faith and government, and idea which dates back to two thousand BC in the Judeo-Christian tradition. St. Justin Martyr wrote, “Reason dictates that those who are truly pious and philosophers would honour and love only the truth declining to follow the opinions of the ancients, if they are worthless. For not only does sound reason dictate that one should not follow those who do or teach unjust things, but the lover of truth should choose by all means, and even before his own life, even though death should remove him, to speak and do righteous things.” He then goes on to explain that Christians make the best citizens because they do not only answer to authority out of fear, but out of a devotion to a higher power and love. Oaths are administered for those who do not believe in the higher power, because they need to understand that the power of authority will punish them if they choose to answer untruthfully in court. This is a means of protecting the innocent in a legal trial.
Before Jesus was executed, he was asked if he had stated certain things which were taken out of context. You see, his persecutors already had an “end” in mind, and the “means” to that end were unimportant. Bending the truth in order to make an out of context statement look hostile was the means they chose.
His execution was particularly brutal. Today, it would be much more humane if those who use their First Amendment right to speak freely about their religious faith were put in prison. Thus, the “end” sought by atheists today is for Priests to be put in prison, and the “means” to that end is “hate-crime” legislation. Thus, speaking against atheism (if atheism is categorized with race) or homosexual acts can cause a Priest to be put in prison, even if this is a part of his faith.
However, atheism, much like chosen behavior, is fundamentally different than the genetic color of skin. Catholics will tolerate and live peacefully with atheists, so long as atheists tolerate and live peacefully with Catholics. We do not want you thrown in jail for your anti-Catholic speech. In fact, we would find it noble to die to protect your freedom to speak against us. We only ask the same in return.
Enlightened, Sorry, to mistake you for the people at Crisis Ministries, who BTW do really great works. Your email address (which I assume is fake) maps to people at Crisis. I assumed you were affiliated, despite you IP address belonging to somewhere in Michigan. Look, the “authoritarian, patriarchal, and particularly dogmatic religious sect.” I refer to is the pre-Vatican II variety of Catholicism that the money behind Ave Maria advocates, not all Christians/Catholics. The particularly angry and derogatory terms you use to characterize me gives me all the information I need to know. You even took the time to logically conflate atheism and homosexuality. Nice.