Obama at Georgetown

No, I'm not going to talk about the content of his speech today. Suffice it to say that I thought it was quite good. Sober, intelligent, and confident.

What I really want to say, though, is how proud I am once again of my Alma Mater, Georgetown University, for welcoming Obama to the campus to make his speech.

Of course the anti-abortion Catholic zealots are incensed and outraged that a Catholic University would even acknowledge our country's President, much less give him space to make a speech on the economic situation of our country.

But in spite of this, Georgetown is sticking with the best of its Jesuit tradition for engagement with issues and ideas, even from those with whom the institution's Catholic identity might conflict.

I've been thinking about this in reference to the whole Notre Dame "scandal" and it makes me wonder why the anti-abortion Catholic zealots simply don't demand that Catholic Universities ask on their admissions applications where their prospective students stand on the whole abortion issue and insist that any prospective student who answers this question "incorrectly" should be automatically rejected out of hand. If Catholic Universities and Colleges aren't places where pro-choice politicians can speak about matters unrelated to abortion, then they shouldn't be places where faculty or students who support such politicians should be allowed to matriculate. If these zealots want to "purify" Catholic institutions of higher learning of the "rot" of what they think are abortion apologists, then they should be prepared to effectively shut down just about every single Catholic University and College in this country. After all, significant majorities of faculty and students at Notre Dame and at Georgetown welcome Obama to the campus. How would that be for cutting off your nose in spite of your face?