« previous post |
Main
| next post »
February 16, 2006
Academic Freedom, Catholic Education, and the Vagina Monologues
Steven Shiffrin:
February 16, 2006
Freedom is freedom for truth. Error has no rights. This was
the perspective of the Catholic Church for many centuries. It was used to
support censorship and persecution in many countries. The same perspective was
employed by Protestant countries for the same purposes and by non-religious
dictatorships. The freedom was the same; the truth was different.
At least with respect to the actions of government, Vatican
II changed the perspective of the Church. Vatican II respects the dignity of the
individual and his or her freedom to make religious choices. It respects the
right of individuals to choose error, but hopes to lead them toward its
conception of truth. Liberal Catholics believe that individuals should enjoy
the same freedom with respect to Church teaching. They should, for example,
have been free to maintain that religious freedom was demanded by appropriate
conceptions of human dignity when Church teaching was to the contrary. Traditional
Catholics believe that the freedom publicly to oppose Vatican teachings by Catholics should be restricted, and that freedom of conscience
within the Church is freedom for truth.
The question of what it should mean to be a Catholic
university gets much discussion in Catholic circles. Among other things, I
think such universities should be able to assure a dominant presence of
Catholic faculty in relevant subject areas. But I do not think it should be the
goal of the administration of such universities to eliminate all error from
their campuses, nor do I believe any administration is committed to doing so.
Nonetheless, I do think the Church has a bad record in this regard. Charles
Curran should be teaching at a Catholic university; so should Hans Kung. The point
is not that Curran and Kung were right (on most points I think they are); the
point is that their perspectives need to be discussed and debated in a Catholic
university. That debate will be sharper if the best advocates of their position
are in Catholic universities.
I have two points to make about the Vagina Monologues which
has most prominently been restricted at Notre Dame. First, if you want to
encourage students and members of the general public to see the Vagina
Monologues, tell students they can not have the show on campus or otherwise
limit the ability to see the show. Students and other citizens who would never
have thought to see such a production will rush to see it.
But, generously understood, I assume the real point of
opposing the Vagina Monologues was to send the message that a particular
university is a Catholic university. I think the better way to do that is
education. The better way is to publicly discuss the strengths and weaknesses
of the Vagina Monologues from a Catholic perspective. A public image of
censorial tendencies is not good for Catholic education, and censorial Catholic
education is not good education.
Steve Shiffrin
Comments welcome either on the trackback or to [email protected]
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
https://www.typepad.com/services/trackback/6a00d834536ae669e200d83425ce9d53ef
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Academic Freedom, Catholic Education, and the Vagina Monologues:
» Comments for: "Academic Freedom, Catholic Education, and the Vagina Monologues" from Left2Right Comments
This post is provided as a forum for comments for the Left2Right post: "Academic Freedom, Catholic Education, and the Vagina Monologues" posted on 02/16/2006 [Read More]
Tracked on Feb 16, 2006 12:47:47 PM
» AND MORE LOCAL REACTION. from Cold Spring Shops
Steve at Left2Right has been thinking about the conflict of values inherent ... [Read More]
Tracked on Feb 19, 2006 7:40:36 PM
« previous post |
Main
| next post »