In 1866, the bishops of the United States, meeting in the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore, decided that the United States urgently needed a uniquely Catholic institution of higher learning.
These were some of the darkest days in the history of the American Church. Just three years before, New York City was devastated by the Draft Riots: three days of social unrest sparked when the US government began conscripting working-class men – and particularly Irish Catholic immigrants – to fight in the Civil War. Anti-Catholic sentiment in America had never been higher.
Yet the American bishops took the bold decision to locate their new university in Washington, DC. It took a few years, but The Catholic University of America (CUA) was officially founded on November 13, 1889. Ever since, CUA has wielded far greater influence than its 7,000-student body might indicate. It was among the first research universities in the country; the neighbourhood it occupies, Brookland, has become known as “Little Rome”.
But now the university is facing a financial crisis. An operational deficit of $3.5 million is forcing the administration to consider laying off or buying out 35 faculty members. According to a recent feature in The Chronicle of Higher Education, this may have to do with CUA’s strong commitment to Catholic moral teaching.
CUA is consistently ranked among the most conservative universities in the country. In 2011 its new president, John Garvey, re-instituted single-sex dorms on campus. He called the initiative “a slightly old-fashioned remedy that will improve the practice of virtue.”
It is true that, more recently, CUA made headlines when Fr James Martin – who favours some sort of recognition of same-sex relationships – was invited to speak on campus. In fact, the invitation, later withdrawn, was not issued by the university itself.
The solution favoured by some commentators is for CUA to relax its commitment to orthodoxy: this might attract more liberal-minded students. Yet, as the Chronicle report makes clear, the problem goes deeper than CUA’s campus policies. It is by no means obvious that there is a large enough pool of potential students, liberal or otherwise.
“Roman Catholic high schools, the most reliable pipeline for Catholic University students, are graduating fewer and fewer people,” it warns.
Who is to blame? Traditional Catholics say the problem goes back a very long way. They point the finger at a prelate who died 100 years ago: John Ireland, who served as Archbishop of Minnesota from 1881 until 1918, during which time he led a group of “reformist” bishops calling themselves the Americanists.
The Americanists were concerned with the lack of Catholic assimilation in mainstream society. Their solution was to encourage cooperation between government education departments and parochial schools.
Under Ireland’s model, the state would rent Catholic school buildings during the normal school day, and no religious instruction would be offered. In exchange, nuns and priests were allowed to continue teaching. Catholic students would arrive early for Mass and stay late for catechesis.
Of course, we cannot blame the decline in Catholic schooling solely on the Americanists. For a time, their formula seemed to work. According to the National Catholic Education Association, enrolment peaked at five million in the 1960s – long after Ireland and the original Americanists had died.
Since then, however, Catholic education has become more expensive. In the 1970s, three quarters of parochial schools charged the modern-day equivalent of $300 in tuition annually. That number has risen to $4,000 for elementary schools and $8,000 for high schools.
Experts in the Catholic education system also blame secularising trends for the decline in enrolment. Among them is Carol Ann MacGregor, associate professor of sociology at Loyalty University in New Orleans. She points out that nuns have virtually disappeared from the classroom. This weakens the religious character of our schools and also helps drive up costs. Put simply, nuns are much cheaper to employ than lay teachers.
As it happens, it was against Ireland and his allies – most notably Cardinal James Gibbons of Baltimore – that Pope Leo XIII propagated his encyclical Testem Benevolentiae Nostrae in 1899. The pope did not contend that the Catholic Church and the American republic were incompatible, but rather condemned those who believe “the Church in America to be different from what it is in the rest of the world.” In other words, we must work to make America more Catholic – not to make the Church more American.
The Catholic University of America and “Little Rome” exemplify Leo’s ideal. But they cannot continue to thrive without the cooperation of parochial schools, and as things stand that cannot be guaranteed.
It’s a complicated situation, but one thing seems clear. Those who would see CUA and other Catholic institutions of higher learning flourish should focus on strengthening the Catholic education system’s faith-based identity. Secularism is the problem, not the solution. The challenge is to drive home that message in Catholic schools.
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