It certainly has been a memorable winter thus far!  I hope that the snow closings have not inconvenienced you too much (And yes, that was me tubing down the hill beside Leahy Hall with a group of students during the Presidents’ Day weekend!  Believe me, it was a lot more fun going down than trying to walk back up the hill!).  I would like to take this occasion to express the gratitude of the entire university to Executive Director Carl Petchik and his staff in the Division of Facilities and Operations for working around the clock to clear the university driveways, parking lots and building entrances during the snowstorms.  They did an excellent job.  I am also grateful to Director Thomasine Johnson and the officers and staff of the Department of Public Safety for their constant vigilance and assistance in keeping us all safe throughout the snowstorms.

 

Since my last communication, the nation was placed on “high alert, code orange.”  Although the alert recently has been downgraded, CUA will remain prudently vigilant.  I am grateful to Susan Pervi, Carl Petchik, Victor Nakas, Thomasine Johnson, Joseph Beres and their staffs for their great assistance in reviewing our emergency and evacuation plans and helping CUA remain as prepared as possible in these unnerving times.  I have already communicated sufficiently on the matter so I shall simply express my thanks to everyone who has been helping the university community remain calm.

 

Sadly, over the last few weeks, we parted with two longtime and valued members of the CUA community.  Dr. Thomas L. Wright, associate professor of psychology in the School of Arts and Sciences, died Feb. 20. Next year would have marked the 30th year of his service as a member of our faculty. The Rev. Thomas G. Pater, a Curley Hall resident who passed away Feb. 25, worked for 40 years in various capacities at the John K. Mullen of Denver Memorial Library, even after his official retirement. I ask you to keep both of them in your prayers as we mourn their passing and give thanks for their dedication to Catholic University.

 

In early February, I traveled out to the West Coast to meet with the leadership committee and development staff of the Archdiocese of San Francisco in preparation for this year’s American Cardinals Dinner, scheduled to take place there May 2.  While in California, I visited with a number of alums and other benefactors of CUA to talk about the university, its strategic plan and its many needs.

 

With the assistance of personnel in the Office of Institutional Advancement, I continue meeting with numerous individuals in the Washington, D.C., metro area to introduce them to the wonderful work being done by our faculty, staff and students at CUA.

 

Institutional Advancement News

A capital campaign steering committee has been established to advance the campaign during its current planning phase.  Members of the committee include alumni and trustees Robert Craves, Richard Banziger, Monsignor Michael Bransfield, Archbishop Charles Chaput of Denver, David Donohoe and Neal Rauenhorst; and trustees Robert Crimmins, William McKenna and Mark Tuohey.  The committee will promote CUA to various constituencies and will strengthen continuing support of CUA through the Annual Fund, capital gifts, and bequests and deferred gifts.  One of the indicators of the potential for success of a planned campaign will be a demonstrable, steady increase in the Annual Fund.

 

We have established the “1887 Society,” named after CUA’s founding year, to recognize our benefactors.  The new donor recognition program will be publicly launched at the President's Recognition Dinner on April 4.  The categories within the “1887 Society” include: The Pope Leo XIII Circle ($5 million and above); the Mohler Circle ($1 million - $4.999,999); Bishop Keane Circle ($500,000 - $999,999); Haynes Circle ($100,000 - $499,999); and Kelly Circle ($50,000 - $99,999). 

 

The Office of Alumni Relations continues to engage alumni across the country in a variety of settings.  In late January, a highly successful career panel/networking meeting was held in New York City, thanks to a collaborative effort between the alumni office and the career services office. On Feb. 5, the alumni office, working in collaboration with several academic departments, organized a successful reception for 400 alumni and guests on Capitol Hill.  In addition, the alumni office is sponsoring receptions in Philadelphia, Boston, Washington, D.C., and Chicago to be held in March.

 

Our investment in a new alumni database has proven to be a wise decision.  The new system was installed last fall and has enhanced our ability to maintain addresses, run reports and use alumni information for a variety of purposes, including career services, admissions and, of course, the never ending task of fund raising.

 

The process of identifying prospects and cultivating their interest in and generosity toward CUA is a long and time-consuming process.  These are such difficult economic times which, along with the prospect of war with Iraq, the crisis within the Church and other uncertainties, make the work of advancement even more difficult for CUA.

 

CUA Accomplishments

 

 

Coach Mike Lonergan and his three seniors, (from left) Kevin Wise, Craig Avallone and Matt Hilleary.

On a more positive note, men’s basketball at CUA has enjoyed another great season under the direction of Head Coach Michael Lonergan, who shared Capital Athletic Conference coach of the year honors with Mary Washington College’s coach. Though the team lost a “nail biter” against Mary Washington on March 1 in the 2003 CAC Tournament Championship finals, played in DuFour Center, our Cardinals nevertheless received an at-large bid to the NCAA Division III Men’s Basketball Tournament. The men’s team was awarded a first-round bye and plays in the second round March 8 at DuFour Center. We are so proud of all our Division III women and men athletes and, in particular, of Mike and his team, and we congratulate them on another fantastic season!

 

Our CUA Debate Team has also, once again, distinguished itself with an impressive season as the national debate tournaments loom large on the horizon.  What a tremendous opportunity and experience for our students.  Hats off to Coach Ron Bratt, Dr. Glen Johnson and all who have contributed to the renewal of this great tradition of excellence at CUA.

 

More than 80 of our students are spending their spring break working in service-oriented projects all over the United States for organizations like Habitat for Humanity. Under the guidance of Father Brad Heckathorne, associate university chaplain, 13 students headed to Kingston, Jamaica, to work with the St. Patrick’s Foundation and the poorest of the poor in that city.  What a wonderful witness to our mission!

 

On Feb.19, I traveled to Connecticut to spend a few hours with Bishop William Lori, the newly elected chairman of CUA’s Board of Trustees.  Bishop Lori’s familiarity with CUA and Washington has made the board leadership transition an easy one.  I am grateful for his generous commitment and his enthusiasm for the work ahead.  The board will meet here on March 10-11.

 

CUA and our neighbors, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, co-sponsored two weeks of training seminars in the second half of February for priest canon lawyers —many of them alumni of our canon law programs — who will be working throughout the United States on the canon law aspects of the cases of sexual abuse of minors by clergy.  Our canon law faculty colleague, Monsignor Tom Green, gave presentations throughout the first week of the program.  This is such an important way that CUA, which has the only school and degree granting program of canon law in the United States, can be of real service to the Church in our country during a very difficult time.  In my remarks at the beginning of the sessions, I expressed the hope that CUA would “continue to be a resource in the process of reconciliation and healing and the restoration of trust” that must take place within the Church.

Speaking of canon law, I have appointed Monsignor Brian Ferme as the new dean of our recently re-established School of Canon Law.  Currently the dean of canon law at the Pontifical Lateran University in Rome, Monsignor Ferme brings an international reputation to our campus and its outstanding canon law faculty. He is expected to arrive at CUA within the next week or two.

 

Because of the changes approved for CUA’s School of Religious Studies, Dean Stephen Happel and Monsignors John Wippel and Kevin Irwin have been working on revisions in our ecclesiastical statutes which form part of our Faculty Handbook.  These revisions will require the eventual approval of several groups including the Academic Senate, the Board of Trustees and the Holy See.

 

University Identity and Mission

Although CUA has demonstrated itself time and again to be excellent in so many areas of scholarship, teaching and research over its long history — accomplishments of which we can all be justifiably proud — CUA’s place within and responsibilities to the Church are particular hallmarks of our university.  As has been true within the Church in every age, the individuals charged with discharging those responsibilities can witness tensions and experience challenges that, at times, require responses that are difficult for many people in our contemporary society to accept.  For that reason, CUA must seek a balance in its intellectual approach to society and culture.  For that reason, we all need to reflect often upon our university itself and to remind ourselves of its identity and mission.  

 

CUA is a university, a place where individuals come to participate in the intellectual life as members of a “community of scholars, both faculty and students, set apart to discover, preserve and impart the truth in all its forms” (“Aims of the University,” The Mission Statement of The Catholic University of America).

 

CUA is a Catholic university, a place that “desires to cultivate and impart an understanding of the Christian faith within the context of all forms of human inquiry and values.  It seeks to assure, in an institutional manner, the proper intellectual and academic witness to Christian inspiration in individuals and in the community, and to provide a place for continuing reflection, in the light of Christian faith, upon the growing treasury of human knowledge” (“Aims of the University,” The Mission Statement of The Catholic University of America).

 

CUA is The Catholic University of America, a place that is “faithful to the Christian message as it comes through the Church (“Aims of the University,” The Mission Statement of The Catholic University of America).”  As such, CUA has enjoyed, from its inception, “unique responsibilities” drawing from its “unique relationship with the Holy See and the entire Catholic community” (“Goals of the University,” The Mission Statement of The Catholic University of America).

 

 

There are many other things that could be said about The Catholic University of America but these three paragraphs describe in a very clear and succinct manner who we are (identity) and what we do (mission).  We must remain authentic to and accountable for our identity and mission, regardless of our own personal religious affiliations, our own personal preferences, or our own political, theological or ideological points of view.  When these personal dimensions lead people to attack the Church’s teachings or advocate positions contrary to our institutional identity and mission as the national university of the Church in our country, CUA cannot support them, explicitly or implicitly, in what we do.  This is not something that is always easy or comfortable for everyone to accept.  But, if we were to do otherwise, we would surrender the unique reason for which we were founded.

 

At the same time, our fundamental reason for existence is to be a university within the Church and for the Church in the United States and beyond.  Our primary occupation as an institution and a community is intellectual: to seek the truth and to contribute to its presentation in a way that is faithful to our Catholic identity and mission. The fact of the matter is that, in light of our Catholic identity and mission, not all ideas proposed or values advocated by individual members of the community are of equal weight or necessarily consonant with that identity or mission.  We have an institutional Catholic identity and mission and we stand for something at CUA that often is at variance with what others may believe or want to believe or say or do in society or culture at large.  And we often pay a price for observing our principles.  But even those principles can become caricatured to the right or to the left to the point where we cannot recognize them as being “Catholic.” 

While we may not be the largest or the best-known Catholic institution in the country, the fact of the matter is that, throughout its long history, The Catholic University of America has always been a lightning rod among its Catholic peers.  And it is also a fact that in the minds of some, CUA is never “Catholic enough” while, at the same time, for others, we are always “too Catholic.”

 

I do not believe that we have anything to fear from ideas, even those that differ from our own.  As a university, as a Catholic university and as The Catholic University of America, we should seek to understand them and to be able to articulate our institutional position in the face of them.  But our efforts to understand them in a variety of encounters on campus do not, in themselves, as some believe, always and everywhere constitute the abandonment of our Catholic identity and mission.  Understanding is not agreement, compromise or capitulation.  The “sky is not falling” every time it rains (or snows!).  I think people, often with the best of intentions, mistakenly make that assertion and, unfortunately, “cry wolf” on campus and elsewhere when no wolf is really there.  A truly Catholic education should prevent that from happening and should provide us with the opportunity to courageously defend and voice our Catholic principles and teachings in the face of opposition on and off campus.

 

Disagreement, not destruction.  Education, not contrary advocacy.  Civility in discourse, not personal attack.  These are the imperatives as well as the boundaries that a truly Catholic university must observe.  And these are the attempts at “balance” to which I referred earlier and that our own institutional policies and practices, our Mission Statement, our Statement on Academic Freedom and our university handbooks attempt to express and observe.

 

At the end of the day, it is ultimately (although not solely) my role and responsibility, as president, to safeguard, promote, foster and represent our Catholic identity and mission at CUA to a variety of constituencies.  I have always taken and will continue to take that role and responsibility very seriously, making decisions and judgments, when necessary, that I believe appropriate for the good of the university.  It is my hope, however, precisely because of our Catholic identity and mission, that all members of the university community will think through and even inquire about the implications of their actions before drawing the university into needless public controversy.  The recent flap over Follett Bookstore’s decision to rescind an invitation to Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton to promote her book on CUA’s campus has made the need for thoughtfulness abundantly clear.

 

We must be free to be a university.  And we must also at the same time exercise responsibility as The Catholic University of America in the face of that freedom.

 

This letter is longer than usual.  I thank you for your kind and patient attention and for all you do for The Catholic University of America.  Please continue to pray and to work for peace in our world.