Spring is here, with pomp and circumstance. It is also the season of controversies over the choice of commencement speakers and honorary degree recipients at America’s Catholic colleges. Will the annual conflicts ever end?
Perhaps there is a way. And it would be none too soon.
More than a decade after the University of Notre Dame venerated President Barack Obama at its commencement ceremony, sparking a public outcry from 83 bishops, Notre Dame could soon honor President Biden – a dissenting Catholic who is stridently opposed to the Church on abortion, gender ideology, and religious freedom. The university claims a tradition of inviting sitting U.S. presidents to deliver commencement addresses. But alumni are urging the school not to repeat the 2009 fiasco.