The ‘Catholic Character’ of Our Institutions

Debates about the “Catholic character” of the institution often stir up strong passions and debates at Catholic colleges and universities.  Other “Catholic” organizations likely should be having these discussions, too. Indeed, when Catholic institutions stop having these discussions, it’s usually a bad sign.

Some people think that a “Catholic” university should be just like any other university except with a Catholic chapel somewhere on campus.

A second group believes that a “Catholic” school should probably also teach “ethics” of some sort. Just make sure they understand not to cheat in business, lie on tax forms, or break promises.  And be sure they’re not racist.  Whichever “ethics” tells them not to do that, teach that one.

Members of a third, somewhat smaller group have a sneaking suspicion, which they’re usually not comfortable admitting out loud, that it would be good if the students were taught some “Catholic” values.  What sort of “Catholic” values?  For some, those would also be things like don’t cheat in business, lie on tax forms, or break promises.  Others might add things like “care for the poor” and be sure not to be racist.

A very small group thinks that the “Catholic” character of the university should permeate the entire education of its students.  Students needn’t be Catholic to be taught that Catholics hold a certain view of the nature and dignity of the human person; that Catholics believe the universe is the free act by one God who created the universe as an embodiment of His justice and love, and that we in our own way are meant to be instruments of that justice and love, aided by God’s grace.

Whether non-Catholics and non-Christians accept these ideas for themselves is up to them, but it doesn’t seem like an offense against their freedom to tell them that this is what Catholics believe.  They might even find it somewhat compelling.  Many have.

So, too, it seems reasonable enough to point out that Catholics believe the truths of reason and the truths of revelation will never contradict one another because both have the one God who is their Author.  On this view, the scientist who gets to the truth of the created realm is “reading the Book of Nature” written by the hand of God Himself. And the literature professor who opens up the students’ minds and imaginations is also providing something essential to a “Catholic” education.  As John Henry Newman, our most recent Doctor of the Church, understood, both are crucial aspects of a “Catholic” education.

And yet, this business of “Catholic character” is often a hard sell, as hard as “selling” the persistent value of a liberal arts education.  The battle for both often goes hand-in-hand.  Lose the one, and you’ll soon lose the other.  The university, an institution dedicated to the wisdom attained by gaining a unified vision of all the arts and sciences – “a school of knowledge of every kind,” as Newman described it – is, after all, a Catholic invention.  Catholics should preserve it.

Some faculty resist talk of “Catholic” character because they think they will be forced to teach Catholic doctrine.  But on the view I’ve proposed, if faculty teach the truth that is appropriate to their discipline with excellence, they already are, whether they know it or not, providing a “Catholic” education.

And quite frankly, it would be foolish to ask them to teach things for which they have not been trained.  We don’t ask theology professors to teach organic chemistry; so we shouldn’t ask organic chemistry teachers to teach theology. It shouldn’t be too much to ask, however, that theology teachers at Catholic institutions teach Catholic theology.  Many don’t.

Those who oppose the institution having a “Catholic character” are usually forgetting something – something that those who say they favor the Catholic character of the institution also sometimes forget. The Catholic character of the institution could be ideological, or it could be ethical, depending on how we understand “character.”

You could be a character in a play, or you could be a person with character. Catholicism could be something you talk about, something on put on your advertisements, or it could be something you embody and do, because it has become “second nature” to you. Understood this way, we would judge the Catholic character of an institution by how well it treats people, by the justice it shows employees, and the devotion it shows to students. If that were the Catholic character we were talking about, would those opposed still be opposed?

A friend asked me recently, “Why are so many Catholic institutions so inhumane?”  A faculty member at another school said to me, “I’m not sure I would ever take a job at a Newman Guide School again” because of how badly he had been treated.  My friend suggested that maybe because these schools take themselves to be doing “the big thing” right (whatever they take to be “the big thing”), they think they don’t need to pay attention to how they treat their people.

I don’t really have an answer to this question, other than to say that more “Catholic” universities and “Catholic” institutions (including chancery offices) need to do some serious soul-searching.  The Church’s teaching about the dignity of the human person and its principles of social justice aren’t just for other people and other institutions.

You can’t treat people with contempt, showing little or no concern for their needs or their dignity, and then expect to have any credibility as “Catholic,” whether your claim to that Catholicism is a big, beautiful chapel, a rigorously orthodox theology department, or some terrific programs in social justice.

Whether you consider yourself “wonderfully liberal,” or “blessedly conservative”; whether you teach the Fathers and Doctors of the Church or gender studies and liberation theology; whether you pride yourself on your multi-cultural Mass or on a traditional Latin Mass;  if you don’t treat people with the dignity and respect they deserve, you don’t have a “Catholic” character.  You’re professing an ideology, not being Catholic.