Dan Dixon
Asst. Politics Editor
DESPITE CONCERNS throughout the Notre Dame community (as represented by the Rover’s three-issue series) regarding the decline of Catholic faculty, at least one voice suggests that concerns for diversity are more pressing.
This voice is ND WATCH, a coalition of women from Notre Dame’s faculty and administration. According to their website, “WATCH was created to inform and mentor women faculty; to monitor, investigate and improve university treatment of women; to promote increased hiring and retention of women faculty; to foster communication among women; and in general to support each other and all women at Notre Dame.”
WATCH also has opinions on several other matters. One such matter is the increased hiring of homosexual faculty. Though several members of WATCH neglected to respond to the Rover’s inquiries, the website wonders “if paranoia is developing about what aspect of Catholic doctrine will prevail concerning homosexuality.”
However, it is unclear to some exactly what WATCH is concerned about. Notre Dame’s refusal to include homosexuals in their nondiscrimination clause stems from “An Open Letter to the Notre Dame Community,” a letter written by Fr. Edward A. Malloy, C.S.C.
In this letter, Fr. Malloy states, “To make the change requested would mean that our decisions in this area would be measured by civil courts that may interpret this change through the lens of the broader societal milieu in which we live. This, in turn, might jeopardize our ability to make decisions that we believe necessary to support Church teaching.”
Therefore, the University does not consider homosexual applicants differently than their heterosexual counterparts. On the contrary, Fr. Malloy states, “we call ourselves to act in accordance with what we regard as a higher standard - Christ’s call to inclusiveness, coupled with the gospels’ call to live chaste lives.”
Furthermore, the group is opining on the need to hire homosexual faculty during a time when there is a rapid decline in the number of Catholic teachers at Notre Dame. Groups such as Project Sycamore, whose stated purpose is to preserve Notre Dame’s Catholic identity, challenge WATCH on this point.
One member of Project Sycamore, John Gueguen, Professor Emeritus of political philosophy at Illinois State, points out, “It is crucial to American higher education in general that at least one vibrantly Catholic and academically outstanding university remain on the landscape. In the familiar jargon, ‘there needs to be diversity, a choice.’”
WATCH also states that the importance Notre Dame places on football contributes to a culture that devalues women. The website says, “The strong emphasis on athletics at Notre Dame — in particular, football — may be correlated with sexism or misogyny.”
This male dominated culture, according to WATCH, stems from the Church’s sexism. The fact that women cannot be priests “results in the exclusion of women from certain kinds of positions and particular kinds of power at Notre Dame.”
Does the lack of female representation at the top of the University’s administration mean that women are not valued equally at Notre Dame? Gueguen argues, “Notre Dame ceased to be led mainly by males and priests at least 2 decades ago. Just take a look at who really ‘runs things’ in department after department.”
Contact Dan at ddixon2@nd.edu
| 
