The weakening of Catholic identity through the change in faculty composition has been exacerbated by major changes in the curriculum over time. Now, while elective courses afford the opportunity for a Catholic education, required courses do not provide it. There remain only six required Theology credits, only three of which must be in a specifically Catholic course. Similarly, only six credits are required in Philosophy, none in courses necessarily taught from a Catholic perspective.
While the Philsophy Department enjoys a high national ranking, its character provides an illuminating example of the disconnect between secular and religious values. In his recent autobiography, Dr. Ralph McInerny, a much-honored 52-year faculty member and former head of both the Medieval Institute and the Jacques Maritain Center, paints a bleak picture of the department. Lamenting that “[p]ositions dubiously compatible with the faith are maintained and taught all around us,” he described this illustrative episode:
“A young colleague of mine announced at a departmental meeting that, since he regarded Catholicism as false, he had a moral obligation to disabuse his students of their faith. That is where we have come.” I Alone Have Escaped to Tell You (University of Notre Dame Press 2006, p. 105)
After discussing “the traditional roots” of Catholic philosophy, Dr. McInerny observed that the department now has “a majority of members for whom what I have been saying would be as intelligible as it would be at Meatball Tech.” Ibid.
Similarly, Dr. David Solomon, another long-time and highly respected philosophy professor who directs the important Center on Ethics and Culture, ”worries that serious Catholics no longer dominate the faculty of the philosophy department” and, worse, that “there are only two Catholics [in the Department] under the age of forty-five.].” Riley, God on the Quad (Ivan R. Dee 2006, p. 105.) Today, the number is three under the age of fifty.
If the Catholic character of the critically important philosophy department has been so substantially weakened, it seems safe to say that the effects must be radiating throughout the liberal arts program. The overall judgment of another Notre Dame faculty member in 2001
was that at Notre Dame “Catholicism is communicated primarily as a matter of doing good works, and the hard questions are for the most part ignored.”
The combination of the decline in the proportion of Catholic faculty and the disappearance of a required comprehensive set of theology and philosophy courses means that there is no longer any assurance that a Notre Dame student will be brought into close contact with the rich intellectual life or the moral teachings of the Catholic Church. The determined and informed student will be richly rewarded; but for most it is a risky proposition and, with only 53% of the teachers even nominal Catholics, the odds are not reassuring. (For example, for a number of years until he left Notre Dame last year, a self-acknowledged atheist taught a required first year philosophy course.) Scholastic Magazine, February 21, 2005
This attenuation of Catholic instruction is of special concern because of the religious illiteracy that characterizes so many college students.
The results, as disclosed in surveys, are worrisome. We describe them in the “Students” section of this discussion of secularization.
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