Fr. Robert Barron: Opposing Obama's visit to ND is "taking a stand..."

"... against a fundamental ethical indifferentism." Fr. Barron (who for my money is one of the brightest and most dynamic communicators in the Catholic Church in the U.S. today) made the remark in an interview with The Chicago Tribune:

A college freshman at the University of Notre Dame before entering college seminary in the late 1970s, Barron has paid close attention to the controversy swirling around the university’s invitation to Barack Obama to deliver the commencement speech in South Bend and receive an honorary law degree.

"President Obama is, obviously, a man of many virtues and accomplishments, and a decent human being. But he holds to a public position—legal protection for practically unlimited access to abortion—that is directly repugnant to Catholic moral teaching and anthropology," Barron said. "To make matters worse, President Obama’s advocacy of the Freedom of Choice Act makes him the most radically pro-abortion president in our history."

"The critics mistake this for ‘one issue’ politics. It is, in fact, taking a stand against a fundamental ethical indifferentism," Barron said. "And this is why I join a swelling chorus of those who say someone who holds to the pro-choice position as fully and enthusiastically as the president does should not be given a platform at a university that claims a Catholic heritage and identity."

Read the entire piece. Manya Brachear, the author of the piece, rather accurately describes the reaction of Fr. Thomas Reese, S.J., to Obama at Notre Dame as "ho-hum." And there, in a nutshell, are the two basic positions found among Catholics: deep concern for the identity of the country's most famous (and conflicted) Catholic school, and arrogant indifference, with deference paid to power and prestige, not to truth and life.

Here is a 2007 interview with Fr. Barron:



And here are a couple of Fr. Barron's DVDs, available from Ignatius Press:

• Seven Deadly Sins, Seven Lively Virtues (DVD), by Fr. Barron
• Untold Blessings: Three Paths to Holiness (DVD), by Fr. Barron