The Comprehensive Case Why Obama Should Not Be Honored By Notre Dame

First let me give my full take on personal this. I am pretty much in the camp of Rick Garnett that is perfectly reasonable here.

This is where we stand sixty day in as this Corner poster so well points out-

President Obama and Honorary Degree Apologetics [Peter Kirsanow]

When a Catholic institution confers an honorary degree upon President Obama, it should be prepared to explain, with some degree of rigor, why the public should believe the institution takes the following actions of the president seriously:

The executive order reversing the Mexico City Policy that prohibits the use of taxpayer dollars to perform abortions in other countries;

The votes against the Illinois version of the Born Alive Infant Protection Act that would require medical care be provided to babies born after botched abortions — as opposed to leaving the babies to die;

The order allowing the use of federal funds for embryonic stem-cell research that may (and likely will) lead to the destruction of human life;

The declaration that he will sign the Freedom of Choice Act, a bill that would reverse virtually every restriction on abortion, ranging from parental-notification laws to laws against partial-birth abortion;

The expected abrogation of the "conscience clause" that permits observant Catholic (and other) health-care workers to decline to perform abortions;

The nomination of Kathleen Sebelius, arguably the most pro-abortion governor in the U.S., to head the Department of Health and Human Services;

The unalloyed support for Roe v. Wade that permits abortions at any stage of pregnancy.


Merely stating that the honor is being conferred in recognition of the president's historic election is insufficient. The historic nature of the election has already been marked thousands of times in thousands of venues. Any incremental value in having it done yet again — only this time in the form of an honor bestowed by a Catholic institution — must be explained against the actions noted above. Otherwise, it appears prominence and celebrity trump principle and values.
03/30 09:24 AMShare

This is where we stand at this very early date. Much of has been made of the Secretary of State sort of goof at the Our Lady's most important shrine in Mexico. But the real outrage was after that visit she went directly to Houston where she received the highest award from Planned Parenthood and said among other things "was very proud when President Obama repealed the Mexico City policy".

Think about that for a moment.

Doug Kmiec who spent much of his reputation defending Obama and advocating him has rushed to his defense.

But it is telling in a very honest and upfront article posted at the Archdiocese of San Francisco web site the George Wesolek is director of Public Policy/ Social Concerns for the Archdiocese of San Francisco is having none of it as to the praise that Kmiec gives.

Along with others, I heard during the campaign from pro-Obama Catholics and Catholic organizations established to promote his candidacy that Obama would accomplish more than the previous administration to curtail abortions and promote life using "non-divisive" strategies. I have been eagerly looking for indications that this was indeed the case.......

and

Most distressing, is that there is no reaction from those pro-Obama Catholics and Catholic organizations that were and are apologists for Obama and his policies. These organizations - Catholics United, Alliance of Catholics for the Common Good, Network and others - provided Catholics with a scenario that painted Obama as "pro-life." Some of them openly said that they were pro-life and would work to move policy in a pro-life direction under Obama. Where are they now? Where are there any policy initiatives that would blunt the irrevocable thrust of these Obama actions early in his presidency?.......

In fact the main thrust of these groups is to attack Catholics that have some problem with this invite!!!

Further it gets worse. We see that the people that the President has vetting Judges come from radical pro-choice groups. In fact in other critical areas we see key positions relating to domestic policy manned by people from organizations such as Emily's list. A organization that found Senator Mary Landrieu too moderate on abortion to support in a past election.

We have not even got to the fact that the President is on the record of even wanting to repeal the Defense of Marriage act.

If George Wallace had been elected President instead of Nixon would Notre Dame have invited him? Would they have invited after he rescinded several orders dealing with integration and was poised to further use his power to stop the real needed advancement of Civil Rights? Would Notre Dame being giving such a President a honorary degree as to the LAW of all things? Would they have justified this by some reason of "having a conversation" whatever that means?

I have huge doubts any of this would have happened.

Even on issues such as torture where Catholics have disagreements with the Obama administration we find the new Obama policy is much like the old old Bush policy in many ways.

For good or for bad Notre Dame is one of the premier symbols of the Catholic faith in America to both Catholics and non Catholics. To say the least to many of my non Catholic friends what Notre Dame is doing is baffling to them. They don't understand how this can occur and really see it as a endorsement of the Church for these policies.

That is not true of course but to explain the whole sordid maze of canon Law, how the Bishops or the Vatican has no real control over Notre Dame, etc is in the end just not doable. It looks like I and others are just being legalistic. In fact maybe we are.

It is a shame that the Church , after having its credibility damaged in such a severe way after the clergy sex abuse scandal , that was starting to recover appears again to be engaged in hypocrisy. Now that charge might not be fair because we Catholics that pay attention to these sagas know the fine details of what is going on. But to the average Catholic in the pews and non Catholic that don't follow it they will not see it.

There are problems on several levels here.

Let us leave the topic of abortion and other "life" issues and go to another topic of Social justice concern among Catholics.

Douglas Kmiec remarks in his comments I linked above that Obama is against the "the exploitation of the immigrant " As many journalist noted our pragmatic (as Kmiec describes him) President when he was Senator pretty much screwed the immigrant for political advantage.

Obama has attempted to respond to this but people that know the process will have none of it.

Ruben Navarrette, Jr. who is one of the leading journalists in the nation on this issue said quite bluntly:

As for Obama, United Farm Workers leader Delores Huerta was right when, during a tour of a Southwest in support of Hillary Clinton during the Democratic primaries, she told Hispanic audiences that Obama was a “Johnny come lately” to Hispanic causes. It was one reason that Hillary—who aggressively went after the vote by spending money, setting up an organization, lining up endorsements, etc—dominated the Hispanic vote in the primaries, beating Obama 2-to-1 among this segment.

Nor was Obama, according to Senate leaders, intricately involved in the Senate negotiations over an immigration bill. In fact, he supported the union-friendly “poison pill” amendment designed to weaken the guest worker provision of the legislation, which was essential to earning the support of Republican lawmakers. You’ll never hear it from leftleaning Spanish-language media or Latino liberals, but Senate Democrats helped kill immigration reform. Majority Leader Harry Reid used political sleight of hand to make it seem as if the Republican minority had mustered up the power to defeat reform. That was the point of a much criticized but entirely accurate Spanish-language ad from the McCain campaign that began airing in September.

Now everyone that knows anything about the process know what Reuben is saying is true. Including the very good lobby people various Catholic group had working this issue. Yet there was silence on this and the then Senator Obama was allowed to skate on this.

In fact we are treated to the irony that Doug Kmiec , that supported Romney that used the McCain position on immigration against him all over the place, is now pontificating on this issue.

I use that as yet another example of what has President Obama done that should merit such a honor. As to immigration reform Navarette makes the common sense observation that common sense immigration reform now is very unlikely. Note that article was written before the current economic woes that even make such a political hot potato as this even more unlikely. Will Obama want to do Health Care or immigration reform? His political capital is not limitless. From past experience we see that President Obama does not exactly have the Political guts that a Bush or McCain had on this issue . So the deportation, the families of mixed legal status living in the shadows, and a increasing American public rage over this continues. A rage that now will be fueled by populist anger dealing with their economic state. Obama played a real large role in this.

Yet from Catholic circles as to the issues above there appears to be no real moral and needless to say political consequence. We see this with the Notre Dame invite.

I suppose and I think it is likely that perhaps Notre Dame is being strategic here. They realize that once President Obama continues his anti life agenda (and FOCA related items) combined with judicial selections and a policy that will try to undermine the Defense of Marriage Act that it will only get worse. So lets get it out of the way and invite him. I find this to be a very poor reason not rooted in any Catholic morals I am aware of.

In 1972 what if Wallace had got elected President. I find it unlikely but what if? People forget that Nixon had to do a lot of the nut and bots of executing the laws regarding the dismantling of state mandated segregation. A contribution , by his political skill, is being more and more noted. What if Wallace had come in and in his first 60 days put a huge stop to that. Would Notre Dame have invited him? Would they have invited him under the pretense of keeping the conversation open?

I very much doubt it. There are principles here at stake that are far reaching.