Pope Participates in Week of Prayer for Christian Unity

Pope Benedict XVI commemorated Christian Unity Week by praying for union among believers and reminding Catholics of their ecumenical responsibilities. He said that ecumenism is the responsibility of all faithful Christians, not just a few, and that “the unity we strive for cannot result merely from our own efforts." but instead  “it is a gift we receive and must constantly invoke from on high.” read more at the National Catholic Register.

From the Archives: A Supposedly Fun Thing

The unfortunate news of the capsizing of the Costa Concordia cruise ship off the Tuscan coast this weekend brought to mind one of David Foster Wallace's most popular pieces, originally published in a 1996 edition of Harper's as "Shipping Out: On the (Nearly Lethal) Comforts of a Luxury Cruise," and later republished as "A Supposedly Fun Thing I Will Never Do Again." Read his original article on his time on the 7NC Megacruiser Zenith here. An excerpt:

"You are, here, excused from even the work of constructing the fantasy, because the ads do it for you. And this near-parental type of advertising makes a very special promise, a diabolically seductive promise that's actually kind of honest, because it's a promise that the Luxury Cruise itself is all about honoring. The promise is not
that you can experience great pleasure but that you will. They'll make certain of it. They'll micromanage every iota of every pleasure-option so that not even the dreadful corrosive action of your adult consciousness and agency and dread can f*** up your fun. Your troublesome capacities for choice, error, regret, dissatisfaction,
and despair will be removed from the equation. You will be able-finally, for once to relax, the ads promise, because you will have no choice. Your pleasure will, for 7 nights and 6.5 days, be wisely and efficiently managed."

You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown

We at the Center for Ethics and Culture congratulate our old friend, Msgr. "Charlie" Brown, a graduate of Notre Dame, who on the Feast of the Epiphany was ordained Archbishop Charles Brown by Pope Benedict XVI in Rome. He now goes to take up his new position as papal nuncio in Ireland. Bishop Brown has spoken at a number of our events over the past five years, most notably the annual Fall Conference; he helped organize our annual medical ethics conference when we took it to Rome; and he has been a good friend of many of us at the Center, especially David Solomon, who has know him since he was an undergraduate at Notre Dame. You can read Pope Benedict's homily for the occasion here.  Let us pray for the new archbishop, and for the whole Church, as he goes serve Ireland, where the Church is in great need of his holiness, wisdom, and compassion.

New journal of Catholic culture

The Center for Cultural and Pastoral Research, a recently founded subsidiary of the American session of the Pontifical John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family, is launching its new online review Humanum in November 2011. http://www.humanumreview.com/

The Future of Catholic Higher Education

Inside Higher Ed has an article today on "The Key Task for Catholic Higher Ed" by Rev. Gregory Kalscheur of Boston College. He worries that while Catholic universities are working hard to maintain a Catholic ethos in their Campus Ministries, Student Activities, and even Residential Life, they are ignoring the most essential aspect of a Catholic education: the Catholic intellectual tradition.

An excerpt:
"Ten years after Ex Corde was formally adopted by U.S. Catholic bishops, Catholic colleges and universities today must meet the challenge to reaffirm and revitalize their engagement with the Catholic intellectual tradition. Failure to do so will mean that they are content by default to risk leaving Catholic identity to what happens outside the classroom by abandoning the conviction that, to be authentically Catholic, they must integrate their 2000-year intellectual legacy into the academic life of their campuses."

Read the full article here.

The Contraception Mandate

Notre Dame Law Professor Rick Garnett has a column in USA Today arguing that the mandate for contraception coverage in all new healthcare plans should be scrapped. The mandate violates the conscience rights of religious institutions who are opposed to contraception, abortion, and sterilization. An excerpt:

"It is true that the administration's proposed mandate includes an exemption for some religious employers, but it is so stingy as to be nearly meaningless. It does nothing for individuals or insurers, and it applies only to employers whose purpose is "the inculcation of religious values" and that hire and serve primarily those of the same religious faith. The vast majority of religious educational, social-welfare and health care organizations — not to mention the ministry of Jesus on earth — do not fit this crabbed definition.

The proposed exemption covers only inward-looking, members-only, religious-instruction organizations while excluding those that respond to the call to feed the hungry, care for the sick, house the homeless and share the good news with strangers. Religiously affiliated hospitals, charities and universities that serve people of other religions would be vulnerable. The exemption assumes that religion is only about belief and values, not service, sacrifice and engagement. It purports to accommodate religious believers, but it actually would confine their belief."

Read the full column here.

Fall Conference news coverage

LifeSiteNews ran an article last week on our annual Fall Conference. Kathleen Gilbert has a lengthy article giving the flavor of the proceedings. Find it here. An excerpt:

"Wandering among crowds of professors, scholars, and students at the University of Notre Dame for the 12th annual conference of the Center for Ethics and Culture (CEC) for the first time, one can get a little overwhelmed.

Sit down with a Baptist scholar with a thick Southern accent, and he may just start talking to you about the richness of Catholic social teaching, and Marian tradition.

Or you might just run into the “Orthodox posse,” a group of Eastern scholars often hovering near ethicist Tristram Engelhardt, who may buy you a scotch and ask just why exactly you haven’t converted to the true faith.
In any event, the first thing that’s clear is that the CEC annual Fall conference is no ordinary scholarly conference. The second, is that this conference forms an intellectual catalyst for advancing the culture of life virtually unparalleled at any other university in America."