SOUTH BEND, IN - Father Jenkins Off Millennium Promise Board
It is a pleasure to be able to provide some good news, especially during this Christmas season.
Father Jenkins and Millennium Promise.
In our continuing oversight of matters relating to the Catholic identity of Notre Dame, we discovered a few days ago that Father Jenkins is no longer listed as a member of the Millennium Promise's Board of Trustees. We thereupon confirmed with the organization that he is in fact no longer a board member. Nor is one of Notre Dame’s most prominent supporters, Board Chairman Emeritus Donald Keough. The organization’s spokesperson said that their terms had expired – evidently during the past several weeks -- and that they are not standing for reappointment.
You will recall that we discussed Father Jenkins’s membership in this organization, with its strong pro-abortion and pro-contraception policies, in a recent newsletter. We noted that, while Father Jenkins defended his board membership in his letter to us, he added that he was “reviewing all my and Notre Dame’s associations to assure that they accord with our Catholic mission.”
Father Jenkins’s decision not to continue on this board is of course welcome, for his membership plainly did not “accord with [Notre Dame’s] Catholic mission.” As we wrote him, the fact that he abstained from participating in matters relating to abortion or contraception did not solve, but rather exacerbated, the problem:
We are frank to say that we do not understand how advising the Millennium Promise Board that you would not participate in matters relating to abortion or artificial contraception solves, or even mitigates, the problem. The organization’s fund-raising projects surely do not mention your disclaimer, and accordingly your membership amounts to a Notre Dame stamp of approval for the organization’s fund-raising efforts. The abortion and contraception program are among the beneficiaries. Thus the Board has the advantages of your membership without the disadvantages of your unsympathetic participation in matters relating to abortion and contraception.
If it is true that Father Jenkins would likely have continued in this position but for its disclosure and attendant criticism, it is also true that he did decide to cease serving, and for that he deserves credit.
SYCAMORE TRUST BOARD CHANGES
We regret to report that Dick Allen, a Board member since Sycamore’s inception who has provided invaluable service, has resigned because of the press of his many other professional obligations.
We are pleased to report that three other outstanding alumni have joined the Board. They are:
Edmund J. Adams (‘63L), who is Of Counsel to, and former Chairman of, a major Cincinnati law firm, Frost Brown Todd LLC. He has been President of the Notre Dame Club of Greater Cincinnati and received their Award of the Year in 2004. A son and a daughter are Notre Dame graduates and another daughter is an alumna of St. Mary’s. Mr. Adams was Chairman in 2006 of the Ohio Board of Regents, the body with responsibility for all State colleges and universities, and was a Board member from 1999 to 2008. He has served and continues to serve on a host of public and private committees and boards.
Dr. Thomas S. Hibbs (ND PhD ’87) is Dean of the Honors College at Baylor University and was before that Chair of the Philosophy Department at Boston College. Both a distinguished scholar and an insightful and broad-ranging critic, as you can see from the Baylor website, Dr. Hibbs has written widely in books and articles on Aquinas and related subjects as well as on film, culture, literature and higher education. His Catholic World Report cover article on Notre Dame is especially noteworthy. A frequent university lecturer, he has been a panelist at Notre Dame on a Class of 1952 panel on the Catholic identity of Notre Dame and was a keynote speaker at the recent major conference sponsored by Notre Dame’s Center for Ethics and Culture.
Rev. John J. Raphael, SSJ (ND ’89), the Principal of St. Augustine High School in New Orleans, was also a keynote speaker at the Ethics & Culture conference and is a vibrant voice in the pro-life movement. In his eloquent letter to Father Jenkins about the Obama affair, he wrote: “As an African American and a priest, as a principal of a Catholic high school and a member of the Admissions Advisory Board of the university, I cannot adequately express in words how deeply this action offends those who are committed to carrying out the task of Catholic education and witnessing to the Gospel of Life in the context of a Catholic school.” Your best introduction to Father Raphael will be to watch the video of his compelling address at the ND Response Rally on the Quad on Commencement Day.
With your support, we look forward to a year of enlarged commitment by the Notre Dame family to the preservation and strengthening of the Catholic identity of Notre Dame.
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