<p>Thanks for the update. Good news for archiemom and gdogpa and their Villanova kids. I can’t link to today’s paper without subscribing and there isn’t a google link yet. Can you link to the article?</p>
<p>I apologize to college2kids, claremarie, all other readers and especially JHS who started this thread for us. </p>
<p>I honestly have no idea what some on this board believe or that some ideas are under debate. I am not so well read to have encountered this before. I support anyone who believes in geocentrism even if I don’t. I was not making fun. And evidently there are complicated scientific ways to think about this that involve how the universe moves. I am still reading. It’s interesting.</p>
<p>edit: although I care a whole lot about gay rights issues - creationism, geocentrism, any-other-ism don’t get me personally worked up. Usually these beliefs don’t directly negatively impact others. That is my criteria for caring.</p>
<p>While I agree, in principle, with much of what the CNS is trying to accomplish, I have taken issue with their list of “approved” schools, if you can call it that. Have had several long discussions with people associated with CNS on this very topic. Certainly, those schools that CNS loves can be excellent choices for some students. But not many. They are niche schools – many of them are smaller than the high schools that most of our kids attended. They offer very limited courses of study, and no opportunities at all to live in the world, as I believe that my kids are called to do, both now and when they are working adults. These schools seem to have tremendous appeal in the homeschooling community, as well as for parents who have reason to believe that their kids are especially susceptible to negative peer/professor influences. But my argument has always been that parents who have formed their kids well should be confident enough to send them just about anywhere. (With some exceptions, of course.)</p>
<p>For future reference: The Philadelphia newspapers’ website is extraordinarily annoying, but you don’t have to subscribe to get access to the articles. You do, however, have to poke around to find anything that isn’t on page 1 of a section.</p>
<p>I have pretty much shared all my thoughts. Except I am feeling a lot of sympathy for Rev. Donohue, who has a lot of different people who think he answers to them. I imagine him praying rather fervently in order to maintain his composure and attitude of love as he thinks about, in turn, his Communications faculty, his students, Mr. Miller, the press, Communications faculties elsewhere, and the members of the Cardinal Newman Society.</p>
<p>The Archbishop’s office has not weighed in on this publicly at all. But I wonder if it hasn’t privately, or if Rev. Donohue wasn’t trying to make certain he didn’t hear from them privately. Philadelphia has a new archbishop who has a history of taking more, and more extreme, public positions than the previous officeholders, and who is not necessarily a fan of the establishment Catholicism on the Amtrak Corridor. I think everyone is holding their breaths a little waiting to see just how militant he intends to be here.</p>
<p>It’s reasonably clear that this was not just part of a day’s work at Villanova. This is a situation that wrongfooted a lot of people, on all sides of the issue. It will be interesting to see whether it remains a one-off sport or whether it provokes ongoing conflict that wasn’t apparent before.</p>
<p>As someone who knows a lot of committed Catholics at Notre Dame (and some very uncommitted ones, as well), I’m curious if Notre Dame still meets claremarie’s requirements for “Catholic-enough.” Ditto for Georgetown or BC.</p>
<p>Villanova is not a diocesan school, or an arm of the Roman Church itself (which Catholic University in Washington D.C. is). But I believe it is subject to diocesan authority on matters of doctrine, and it is very much a Catholic university whose key administration and faculty consists of ordained priests who are members of a Catholic monastic order.</p>
<p>So, in the end, except for the work of a few zealots and “journalists” in need of sensationalism, this was much ado about nothing. </p>
<p>Villanova is still the school it was and still is a school that tries to find a reasonable balance to the basic needs and wants of its students and alumni. Miller found a more welcoming home for his performance in an arrow shot of the original location. Seems to be a winning combination!</p>
<p>Of course, to the vocal forces that espouse the long tradition of attacking the role of the Catholic Church in education, this will be yet another opportunity to consider it diminished by the decision of Villanova. It remains interesting how the voices that clamor for diversity and acceptance cannot stand schools that are different from their expected secular norm. While the ostracization through limiting access to the public education dollars has been extremely successful at the K-12 level, it has not worked as well in an environment where private schools compete and usually excel on a level playing field. </p>
<p>How irritating is must be that private schools can make decisions based on their sole discretion. The horror! The horror!</p>
<p>xiggi - First the university made the invitation at their sole discretion. The article says it went through the approval process. Then some from outside the university objected and the university rescinded the invitation. No one from outside the university was involved with the original invitation. Is that not a correct analysis?</p>
<p>This is not a case of outside forces who expect Villanova to conform to secular norms starting a controversy, unless you think the cancellation of the invitation shouldn’t have been reported. Does that kind of cancellation by a university president happen on a regular basis? Is it only the fact it is a Catholic school that makes it newsworthy?</p>
<p>If the issue is really with content and not with his orientation, will Villanova now make a point of inviting a less controversial openly gay speaker? I am NOT arguing this is necessary. However, it might settle that question once and for all, if the university cared to settle it, now that this is all in the national news. Maybe the basketball player is that speaker? I am wondering if the Cardinal Newman Society would support any openly gay speaker? </p>
<p>I am glad there are gay students quoted who are comfortable and happy at Villanova.</p>
<p>“I am wondering if the Cardinal Newman Society would support any openly gay speaker?”</p>
<p>Can’t speak for the CNS, but there would likely be little objection to an openly homosexual speaker invited to discuss accounting, or music theory, or structural engineering. With his or her clothes on. The difficulty arises when the speaker’s sexual activities are the focus of his presentation. </p>
<p>As for the fact that Miller’s workshop got through the initial invitation approval process, there are tons of programs on most campuses every week. It’s not possible to give them all the full scrutiny that would reveal every issue of concern. Especially where the inviting department is trying to fly under the radar.</p>
<p>Wow, xiggi, you are sure whistling past the graveyard here (in #150).</p>
<p>I agree that Villanova is trying in good faith to find a reasonable balance, and that one can HOPE this winds up as much ado about nothing. </p>
<p>But one could choose to highlight some other aspects of it.</p>
<p>First off, these articles haven’t been written by a “journalist”. They were written by someone who has been a full-time education reporter for at least 15 years with a major daily newspaper, who has won national prizes and made headline news. You can air quote all you like, but it’s news.</p>
<p>Academics all over the country are taking shots at Villanova over it. This is not going to be good for Villanova when the peer surveys go around.</p>
<p>The president of a significant university has intervened and canceled a program created and supported by a professor and her department chair, and previously approved through normal channels. That doesn’t happen every day, or every other day, or every year for that matter. He is going to have a bunch of angry faculty members on his hands. Many may agree with his decision in substance, but very few will approve of how it was handled.</p>
<p>He says he did it because of his personal reaction when he viewed some of Miller’s taped performances, and I will take his word for that, but there isn’t much question that he was LOOKING at Miller’s taped performances because outside zealots were mounting a campaign, and he was probably looking at recordings the zealots gave him. So at least to some extent he clearly bowed to outside pressure, and I’m sure many will say that he cravenly caved to it. Whatever the balance was in fact, for the zealots this will be chum in the water, and they are not likely to be satisfied with one little taste of power.</p>
<p>I think the better idea by Nova president would have been to pay the "artist’ to go to a CC for 2 years,work on his craft and reapply for admission… ;)</p>
<p>I think one issue with this thread is that some don’t seem to think canceling the invitation seems very important. They may think only the press made this a controversial story. In a university it is a really big deal:</p>
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<p>^^What the president of Hamilton said about an event that eventually was canceled. </p>
<p>It is obvious that I cannot offer an anlysis on the chain of event … anymore than other observers. All we can do is speculate on the accuracy of statements by various parties. If my speculation is important, I believe that the artists was invited by Heidi Rose who obtained departmental approval (for funding purposes, I assume.) I further speculate that the uproar this created among alumni and students (regardless of one thinks of the validity of the uproar) gave reasons for the leadership of the school to cancel the event.</p>
<p>Fwiw, I do not really look at the content of the proposed event in determining if it was wrong or right to invite and de-invite Miller. I look at the right for a school to reach the decision that corresponds to its constituency. And, like it or not, the alumni of Villanova are very much part of its constituency.</p>
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<p>Reporting the cancellation is common sense. As I have written in my first comments in this thread, that is also ALL the school had to do. The leadership of the school did not have to explain or justify the action anymore than thousands of schools feel the need to host and support eminently questionable performances or workshops.</p>
<p>xiggi: For some reason I’ve been assuming you are either in grad school or on university staff someplace? Do you not not believe there are academic freedom/censorship issues involved here? What do you think about the Hamilton president’s statement I quoted?</p>
<p>Hamilton was criticized by some for not canceling a controversial speaker. And then criticized by others when they did cancel.</p>
<p>I don’t think this point is a secular vs religious discussion, unless we assume religious schools don’t have academic freedom. Maybe that is one of the basic issues here?</p>
<p>If this is a reference to the peer assessment survey of USNews, let me suggest you make an effort to find the instructions given to the officials who are supposed to evaluate the distinction of the academic programs. Good luck finding a requirement to measure the openness, integrity, and morality of a school. If such requirement existed, you should have quite a sea change at the top! </p>
<p>This said, I am sure you also know that I do not believe that officials at the school pay much attention to that survey, if not to attempt to manipulate the outcome through whimsical responses. </p>
<p>However, you might have a point in that the court of public opinion might not be as charitable in its final analysis. But, I do not believe that this court could not be more closed-minded and biased than it currently is. Let’s be honest about the fact that the people who might select Nova in earnest will not be swayed negatively by this decision. And the people who would never consider a Catholic school such as Nova do not need more ammunition for their blazing guns.</p>
<p>Tim Miller has been supporting himself as an artist and educator for 30 years. Here’s his recent and near-term performance (not workshop) schedule (and note that Villanova was not included, although it has not been updated since January):</p>
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<p>It looks like the current show is a couple of years old, which is why he is doing it mainly at colleges. He had significant runs in theaters in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and elsewhere in 2010-2011. The weeks-long stay at the University of Colorado is as a director for a student ensemble show.</p>
<p>And here’s a segment from a review of his current stage show by the Chicago Tribune’s chief theater critic:</p>
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<p>In short, this guy is pretty mainstream. He’s not a household word or a matinee idol, but he’s a successful, respected working performer, and has been for a long time.</p>
<p>Alh, I am neither in graduate school nor a staff member of a university. I do believe that there are indeed issues of academic freedom in play here, but probably disagree about the level it did apply in this case. I strongly believe that more care should be exercised at the highest level of academia to ferret out rogue teachers and academic support staff who implement curriculum that fits individual agenda. This should be done with objectivity and … with sufficient transparency for anyone with an interest in a particular school to ascertain if the school corresponds to the expectation.</p>
<p>And, lastly, rest assured that I do not support censorship of any kind, especially since the causes I support have been victimized by censorship and discrimination for centuries in this country. I am happy to start a dialogue at any time about freedom in the academic world. </p>
<p>Should we start with school choice? </p>
<p>PS As far as the Churchill position, all I can say is that it speaks volumes about any school that accepted such person for a speaking engagement or for teaching the next generations.</p>
<p>JHS, I find it interesting that while you object to xiggi’s “air quotes” around the word “journalists” you have used the word “zealots” three times in one paragraph in post #153.</p>
<p>Do Villanova alumni or other interested parties really have to be considered zealots to object to a speaker like Miller? I know that you think that “he’s a successful, respected working performer, and has been for a long time” but that’s really just your opinion and is apparently not shared by all who are familiar with his work.</p>
<p>I really do think this is a tempest in a teapot which has been blown way out of proportion by those who think that academic freedom requires that Catholic institutions must always set their principles aside for every “artist” who may wish to promote an agenda which is in opposition to their values.</p>