Obama and Notre Dame

President Obama faced protestors when he gave the commencement address at the University of Notre Dame on May 17. Not only does the President profess choice in reproductive freedom, a position opposite from Roman Catholic doctrine. But Notre Dame gave him an award - contrary to Catholic policy that people who oppose major policy should not be given awards.

Sixty of 290 active Catholic bishops denounced the university and its president, Father John Jenkins. American Catholics have struggled over the centuries to balance desire to assimilate into society with fear of losing their faith in the nation's melting pot. This latest controversy points to assimilation winning.

Beginning in the 1800s, American Catholics insulated themselves by building an alternative universe of schools to educate their children, hospitals to care for their sick, and cemeteries to bury their dead. Yet they also wanted to be as red, white, and blue as any Connecticut Yankee. They fought in wars, worked in factories, and turned out college graduates to join the nation's elite, finally arriving with the election of John F. Kennedy in 1960. Notre Dame began with Eisenhower inviting Presidents to deliver commencement addresses.

Another recent example of assimilation winning: A Miami Herald poll showed 78% of Miami Catholics still having a favorable impression of priest Alberto Cutie, after revelations that he has had a girlfriend of two years. "What worries me most is how God views me," he said. "The institution, the church, is something else."

[By David Gibson, Washington Post, May 17, 2009. Gibson, a Catholic, is author of The Coming Catholic Church: How the Faithful are Shaping a New American Catholicism.]