10 Years Later: Re-Examining Montserrat

Montserrat holds a unique place at Holy Cross.  The first-year program is extolled by school officials as a key facet of a Holy Cross education and is advertised to prospective students as a foundational academic experience for studies in the liberal arts.  Yet many current students and alumni seem to loathe the program and frequently cite it as one of the low points of their time at Holy Cross. Clearly there remains a disconnect between administrators and students regarding the purpose and practicality of the Montserrat program: what the College describes as “an enduring quest for intellectual, personal and spiritual growth” represents a frequent source of disappointment within an otherwise collectively esteemed academic experience.  As the College commemorates the program’s tenth anniversary this year, the Montserrat program remains noble in intent and appealing in principle, but it has three primary problems: inaptness of structure, ambiguity of purpose, and incongruity of curriculum.

While criticisms of the Montserrat program are varied, the most common relate to the program’s length and structure.  During the summer before their freshman year, incoming students are asked to select their top five seminar choices, in one of which they are guaranteed a spot.  However, the course descriptions available to incoming freshmen are vague and make no mention of the course’s professor, class readings, or assignments. If a student is placed in a course he or she does not enjoy or find worthwhile, that student is more or less “locked in” to an undesirable class for two full semesters, or 25 percent of their freshman year.

“I don't think reducing the academic component to a semester would be a bad idea,” said a member of the class of 2020.  “After a half of a year passes and we get back from winter recess, I do not see the need to extend the program into the second semester.  It occupies one fourth of the overall courses one can take freshman year, which seems a bit excessive. I think the proposed goal of community and discussion will have been accomplished after one semester if it will be accomplished at all.”

A member of the class of 2019 added, “I think most students right now see [Montserrat] as something that is in the way of them taking more classes that could benefit them, so being very clear about the skills that a student should gain through their Montserrat program and why it is beneficial to move forward in college and life is important.”

To be sure, the “living and learning” component of Montserrat is a desirable one: the notion of spending the entirety of one’s freshman year in an intellectual  residential community is attractive and commendable, and it is difficult to imagine that any academically serious students would be opposed to such an arrangement.  The Holy Cross website describes Montserrat as an environment in which “big ideas addressed in the classroom or at cluster events serve as springboards for conversations that continue over dinner or during a late-night study break—which in turn give rise to enduring friendships.”  As captivating as this description may be, is a structured academic environment that lasts for a full academic year really necessary to foster the sense of community and intellectual engagement the College deems so important? Most colleges that require a freshman seminar require only one semester, and many of those are not taken for academic credit and are focused solely on the communal aspect.  A “lively intellectual and social community that encourages engagement with a broad range of themes and issues” can be every bit as lively and engaging if the academic component of Montserrat were removed or even limited to one semester.

Because Montserrat is a required first-year seminar lasting two semesters, a large assortment of course offerings are available.  During the 2017-2018 academic year, thirty-seven courses or a grand total of seventy-four semester-long seminars within six broadly themed clusters were offered to incoming freshmen.  With enormity of size comes an extremely wide range of themes and syllabi, and having seventy-four distinct courses intended “to accommodate a range of interests,” as stated in the Holy Cross magazine, seems excessive and can potentially lead to extremely narrow curricula.  For instance, one may wonder how previously offered Montserrat seminars like “Images of the Latino in American Cinema” fulfill the program’s self-proclaimed mission of serving as a “dynamic introduction to the liberal arts.” As a Holy Cross professor suggested, “One might wonder, if we are going to have required freshman seminars at all, shouldn't they be of a sort that are grounded in serious, even classic books that introduce students to liberal education, rather than focusing on narrow topics that happen to be of interest to a particular instructor?”

The problematic potential for thematic thinness within the Montserrat program likely stems from various professors’ different approaches to their respective seminars and syllabi.  Holy Cross students have long complained about the inconsistency of academic rigor between various seminars. “I think Montserrat could be improved by having the curricula of the different seminars looked at more closely.  Having a common format and grading system could help the fact that many students feel like they landed themselves a ‘harder’ or ‘easier’ seminar than someone else,” said a member of the class of 2019.

The wild discrepancies in academic expectations between each Montserrat course have more than likely left a negative impression on some professors.  “Years ago a stalwart member of the faculty taught in the program and reported it was the worst mistake of her academic career here, as she was teaching a regular academic course and students kept complaining to her that she was making them do serious academic work while their classmates in other courses had very little work to do yet all earned high grades,” said a Holy Cross professor.  “The fact is, in my observation many faculty simply have little interest in teaching in the program, so the Montserrat director, even with the best of intentions, is compelled to accommodate the wishes, course-wise, of those who agree to take part.”

For a self-described foundational program at a highly ranked liberal arts school, this model of narrowly focused, specialized seminars with a captive audience of first-year students who signed up based only on a short description creates a dangerous possibility for extreme bias and subjectivity within each seminar.  “My Montserrat is shockingly biased. While I do not mind having an atheist professor, it is certainly hard to be in a class where [an] egotistical professor proclaims his atheism at every available irrelevant moment. All the readings we are given slant toward his personal beliefs and when we are given supposedly alternate viewpoints, he does not pick available respectable ones but goes out of his way to make the opposing side look bad,” said a current first-year student.

Despite the program’s potential to exist as a unique and immersive first-year experience for all students, Montserrat rests on a framework that mistakes narrow and potentially ideologically slanted professor-specific interests for a rudimentary introduction to the liberal arts and life at Holy Cross.  In doing so, whether it intends to or not, the program tolerates partiality, compromises its mission, and ultimately collapses upon itself. One must ask, for a program that is supposedly so foundational, so life-changing, and so intellectually riveting: why are many Montserrat seminars focused on relatively narrow topics as opposed to studying truly foundational texts and raising major questions that should be a foundation of liberal education?  Why are rising freshmen given close to zero information—beyond course titles and vague descriptions—about what the course will involve and what the syllabus will entail? Why are rising freshmen unable to know who is teaching a given course before they sign up so they might research the instructor's publications and interests prior to enrolling? Why must Montserrat last for two full semesters with no opportunity to switch courses or professors, especially considering that Holy Cross students only have room for thirty-two classes?

Like so much else at Holy Cross, the answers to these questions are unknown, but the potential for greatness still lingers.  Due to these shortcomings, the Montserrat program has failed to deliver the values it promotes and thereby ceases to maintain any sense of value at all.  As the Holy Cross website states, the program is named after the mountain at which St. Ignatius of Loyola decided to begin “a new life devoted to study, teaching, service, faith and purpose.”  Unfortunately, until Holy Cross can clarify its own purpose for the program and its supposed values, most students won’t be able to either.

Sincere Tips for Study Abroad

Next September, the class of 2020 will head to their various overseas destinations, while the class of 2021 will begin the process of applying for Study Abroad.  As a veteran of the College’s study abroad program, I thought I’d offer a few tips about how to make the best of the experience. They are, I hasten to add, absolutely sincere.  I’ll be as truthful as a Huffpo “news” article.

First, go for a year. The College does not have enough space for you here because we have to build more athletic facilities, so you really have a duty to get off campus. If you miss the Hill, be sure to keep in touch by sending in your tuition payments promptly.  For interior decorating, you could keep the form from the Bursar Office and hang it up with some pictures of your Holy Cross family, to show your friends all the wonderful things that are waiting for you in the U.S. For the rising sophomores, try to pick a program that costs substantially less than Holy Cross—that way, the College gets to pocket the difference, and spend your money on things that don’t matter to you.  The College will appreciate your generous gift, even if nobody ever acknowledges it.

When the time comes to leave,  make sure to see your friends one last time; there’s no guarantee that you’ll be the same person after your study abroad experience. One fun activity you can do with your friends is to book your trips ahead of time. Say you’re studying in Ireland—well, Dublin Airport is just a convenient bus ride away! It’s so easy that every weekend you can just book a new trip to somewhere around Europe. Why spend time in your host country when the Lennon Wall in Prague is all the rage right now?

Once you’ve reached your destination, the next thing to do is post about it on social media.   People need to know everything about your experience, from the food you eat to the funny way that people talk. Now the difficult part of this guide is the “studying” part. I mean, who studies abroad for the coursework!? Every class is optional. Professors don’t care about some dime-a-dozen American student anyway, so why connect with an abroad professor in the first place?   Skip that boring Roman art course. You’ll learn more by grabbing an espresso at that cute little hole in the wall downtown.

The best part about studying abroad is exploring your host country, so you should save it until the last week you’re there.  Your home country will always be there for you. If you’re only studying abroad for a semester, this suggestion still applies because you’re never going to have the same freedom to explore again. You’re there to learn something new! You’ll learn about your host culture at some point, what’s more important is to make sure your Airbnb for Oktoberfest is still valid. Explore a different part of Europe every single weekend you can. Why rest or stay in the local area?  You can do that in America, or during the week. Have some fun and take advantage of cheap airlines. That non-touristy photo of Amsterdam isn’t going to snap itself.

The Americans you meet in Europe will become some of the closest friends you’ll ever make. Who cares that you’ll never see them again? They’re here skipping class with you too. Everyone needs a partner in crime and only other American students get that. Now, you can always bring your new bestie to clubs and organizations at your school, but what is the point in that? You’ve got so much time to go to meetings, you’ve got to go out with them on the town and make them a staple in your Insta posts. The locals will understand.

If you follow these tips, your time abroad will truly change you as a person. You’ll find yourself more cultured, more intellectual, and you have a better grasp on the socioeconomics of the world today. You might have some regrets in the end, for example, never making it to all the cafes in your host city or even spending time with your international friends. It’s not possible to do everything in a year and that includes exploring your own country. It’s just not possible and anyone telling you that you need to spend more time ‘learning about the culture of the country you’re studying in’ just doesn’t get it. At the end of the day though, this was a monumental step forward in your life. At some point you may get the chance to do it again, and this time, maybe you’ll be able to get a better angle on that Tower of Pisa picture.

Core Principles

Since its foundation in 1843, the College of the Holy Cross has dedicated itself to educating young men and women in the Jesuit tradition. The core of the Jesuits’ humanistic mission has been to educate people in a variety of subjects, theories, and points of view. Through this community of open expression and free intellectual debate, students and people learn not only about opposing views, but also how to question and strengthen their own deeply held beliefs. 

Without this free exchange of ideas, the liberal arts mission becomes corrupted, as students self-censor their speech or become reluctant to express their opinions. While this particular trend has not manifested itself strongly on this campus, across the country a growing movement makes it permissible for people to condemn opinions that fail to align with their own.

With the current political environment encouraging activism against the Trump administration, opposite views get drowned out by the overwhelming presence of protesters. Acts of resistance immediately arise after the latest uproar at a Trump administration policy, tweet, or cultural issue.  This trend has bolstered anti-Trump activists. Seeing these acts of defiance and protests constantly in the news enables liberals who believe that they are a part of a movement that has overwhelming national popularity. Moreover, the protest and activism culture only serves to censor or quiet the voices of those supportive of the administration’s policies, because they feel as if they are vastly outnumbered. More importantly, the presence of progressive-led protests and the absence of conservative marches provide some conservatives with the belief that their views are extreme and not socially acceptable. The liberal activists and protesters who rightfully champion free debate and discussion have led to the subconscious censorship of conservative speech. However, more vocal ways of condemning opposing views have resulted from the production of subliminal messages during protests and marches.

Recently, the American left ridiculed Kanye West for being insufficiently anti-Trump. Facing backlash from the militant thought police of the left, Kanye tweeted that he respects the President because he has energy and can identify with that. Kanye also summed up the view of the liberal censorship with his tweet that said “you don't have to agree with Trump, but the mob can’t make me not love him…I don't agree with everything anyone does. That’s what makes us individuals. And we have the right to independent thought.” He also articulated differences of opinion with President Obama over what his policies did for the city of Chicago and tweeted his support for the African-American critic of Black Lives Matter Candace Owens. Within minutes of offering his opinions, Kanye faced tweets and adverse reactions that questioned his mental health with the goal of undermining and delegitimizing his words.

If the leftist mob dislikes something, they will use any tactic, whether it is false accusations of racism, assertions of sexism, or allegations of unstable mental health, until it is gone. Like Clarence Thomas, Ben Carson, or any non-white supporter of the Trump administration, Kanye is not considered a proper representative of the minorities’ opinions. Additionally, the critics who condemned Kanye’s Twitter dialogue with Present Trump for saying that presidents should not engage in policies debates with celebrities fail to mention President Obama’s relationships with the highest class.  Defenses of free thought, like Kanye’s, are crucial to the survival of the American republic. Without them, Americans will begin making political decisions without thinking critically about the issues.

The vilification of people for deigning to think for themselves contradicts the founding of America. The Founding Fathers created a republic through vigorous debate. That debate has continued throughout American history until the present. Institutionally, the offices of the presidency, the Electoral College, and the Senate were constructed in order to calm passing crazes and prevent popularity from subverting the nation. Now, in America’s current culture, people restrict their opinions or emulate the “popular class” in order to gain approval from others in society. This form of restriction of free discussion is equally dangerous because people lose their sense of individualism and begin the march towards a collective identity. Standing against the winds of popularity and social approval is necessary because difficult decisions, ideas, and policies are required to calm a crisis. While it is difficult to maintain one’s opinions in the face of overwhelming social pressures, it is necessary for effective and authentic discussions.

While Holy Cross maintains free intellectual debates, the world outside of Mt. St. James may not. Threats to one’s identity and beliefs will be ever-present as society will try to manipulate or eliminate them. Pressures to interfere with one’s beliefs emerge from partisan politics, trends in popular culture, and from all religions. However, the College of the Holy Cross has provided the same principles that, for the past 175 years, have succeeded in educating students with a strong sense of civic duty, personal identity, and Catholic principles. These principles—a thirst for knowledge, respect for passionate and free debate, and the strong sense of Catholic identity instilled by the College into every crusader—are essential for the survival and growth of the American republic. Armed with these tools every crusader will, when faced with obstacles to free discussion, conquer in the sign of the cross. 

New Ways in Theology at Holy Cross

A little over ten years ago, on the occasion of their 50th Reunion, alumni of the College endowed the Class of 1956 Chair of New Testament Studies, a distinguished professorship associated with the Religious Studies department (Source 1).  In the autumn of 2013, the College appointed professor Tat-Siong Benny Liew to fill this position. Professor Tat-siong Benny Liew received bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Olivet Nazarene University and completed his doctorate at Vanderbilt University (Source 2).  Prior to his appointment at Holy Cross, Professor Liew had been Professor of New Testament at the Pacific School of Theology, and before that taught at Chicago Theological Seminary. According to the Department of Religious Studies webpage, his fields of specialty include “synoptic gospels, gospel of John, cultural and racial interpretations and receptions of the Bible, apocalypticism, and Asian American history and literature” (Source 3).

Professor Liew's numerous publications reveal an unconventional approach to gender, sexuality, and race in the biblical texts.  The 2004 article “Mistaken Identities but Model Faith: Rereading the Centurion, the Chap, and the Christ in Matthew 8:5-13,” provides a representative example. Professor Liew and his co-author, Theodore Jennings, argue that Matthew 8:5-13, the story of the centurion who goes to Jesus to ask for healing for his servant, ought to be interpreted in terms of a sexual relationship.  Matthew’s account, runs the argument, does not concern a centurion and his servant, but a centurion and his lover/slave. “The centurion’s rhetoric about not being ‘worthy’ of a house visit by Jesus (8:8) may be the centurion’s way of avoiding an anticipated ‘usurpation’ of his current boylove on the part of his new patron [Jesus],” they assert. Furthermore, “The way Matthew’s Jesus seems to affirm the centurion’s pederastic relationship with his παῖς, we contend, may also be consistent with Matthew’s affirmation of many sexual dissidents in her Gospel” (Source 4).

In 2009, Professor Liew edited the volume They Were All Together in One Place?: Toward Minority Biblical Criticism.  A copy of the volume is displayed in a case in the Religious Studies Department.  Professor Liew’s contributions give shape to this volume: along with serving as the primary editor, he wrote the introduction to the volume and contributed an essay.  As such, the volume as a whole sheds particular light on Professor Liew’s interpretations of the biblical texts.

Professor Liew’s contribution to this volume, a chapter entitled  “Queering Closets and Perverting Desires: Cross-Examining John’s Engendering and Transgendering Word across Different Worlds,” demonstrates the centrality of sex and gender to his way of thinking about the New Testament.  In the chapter, Professor Liew explains that he believes Christ could be considered a “drag king” or cross-dresser. “If one follows the trajectory of the Wisdom/Word or Sophia/Jesus (con)figuration, what we have in John’s Jesus is not only a “king of Israel” (1:49; 12:13– 15) or “king of the Ioudaioi” (18:33, 39; 19:3, 14– 15, 19– 22), but also a drag king (6:15; 18:37; 19:12),” he claims (Source 5). He later argues that “[Christ] ends up appearing as a drag-kingly bride in his passion” (Source 6). 

Professor Liew continues:

In addition, we find Jesus disrobing and rerobing in the episode that marks Jesus’ focus on the disciples with the coming of his ‘hour’ (13:3– 5, 12). This disrobing, as [Colleen] Conway points out, does not disclose anything about Jesus’ anatomy. Instead, it describes Jesus washing his disciples’ feet. As more than one commentator has pointed out, foot-washing was generally only done by Jewish women or non-Jewish slaves. 12 John is clear that Jesus is an Ioudaios (4:9, 22; 18:33– 35; 19:40); what John is less clear about is whether Jesus is a biological male. Like a literary striptease, this episode is suggestive, even seductive; it shows and withholds at the same time (Source 7).

Professor Liew asserts that Jesus’s “excessive” and “deceptive” speech would be considered “feminine” in the culture of the time (Source 8). In defense of this claim, he states that in Greco-Roman culture:

Women pollute since their moist and soft nature is also more susceptible to the assaults of wanton desires, erotic or otherwise. In short, women are wet and (thus) wild. I am suggesting that John’s constant references to Jesus wanting water (4:7; 19:28), giving water (6:35), and leaking water (19:34) speak to Jesus’ gender indeterminacy and hence his cross-dressing and other queer desires… (Source 9).

He clarifies that he is not suggesting that Christ is actually a woman, but that he is neither male nor female. “I want to suggest that John’s crossdressing Jesus shows that a so-called ‘core’ is but a(n significant) effect of bodily acts,” he writes (Source 10).

Professor Liew’s understanding of Jesus in “Queering Desires” suggests an unusual  interpretation of the Holy Trinity:

Suffice it to say that not only does this exchange of desires place the Father’s identity in question but also that the Father-Son dyad in John is always already interrupted by and dependent on the participation of a third party. One may, as a result, turn around Jesus’ well-known statement in John, “No one comes to the Father except through me” (14:6c): Jesus himself needs others to cum with the Father. Jesus’ statement that “I in them [his followers] and you [the Father] in me” turns out to be quite a description. What we find in John is a Jesus who longs to be “had” by the Father…Things do not get less queer as one gets to the other parts of John’s Gospel. It is noticeable that throughout the Gospel Jesus and his Father form a “mutual glorification society” (5:41; 8:50, 54; 12:28– 29; 13:32; 17:1, 4– 5). This constant elevation or stroking is nothing less than an exciting of the penis, or better yet, phallus. Its consistency is then explainable, since “we all know that after … an orgasmic dissemination or circulation, the phallus, like most penises, becomes limp” (Sifuentes-Jáuregui 2002, 159). Fast forwarding to the passion narratives, Conway observes that John’s Jesus is a “quintessential man” because he “reveals no weakening to the passions that might undercut his manly deportment” (2003a, 175). If this is so, there is also something quintessentially queer here. During the passion, Jesus is not only beaten (18:22– 23; 19:3) and flogged (19:1); his body is also nailed and his side pierced (19:18, 23a, 34, 37; 20:24– 28). Oddly, John defines Jesus’ masculinity with a body that is being opened to penetration. 24 Even more oddly, Jesus’ ability to face his “hour” is repeatedly associated with his acknowledging of and communing with his Father (12:27– 28; 14:12, 28; 16:10, 17, 28; 17:1– 25; 18:11), who is, as Jesus explicitly states, “with me” (16:32) throughout this process, which Jesus also describes as one of giving birth (16:21– 22). What I am suggesting is that, when Jesus’ body is being penetrated, his thoughts are on his Father. He is, in other words, imagining his passion experience as a (masochistic?) sexual relation with his own Father (Source 11).

Professor Liew’s editorship of the volume reflects the same method of interpretation. In the introduction to They Were All Together in One Place?, he and his fellow editors explain the idea of “minority criticism,” admitting that the “dominant criticism” will at times “outright dismiss” minority criticism. One of the stated goals here is “relativizing” the “dominant criticism” which exists.  Other chapters in the volume include such titles as “‘That’s Why They Didn’t Call the Book Hadassah!’: The Interse(ct)/(x)ionality of Race/Ethnicity, Gender, and Sexuality in the Book of Esther” and “Incarnate Words: Images of God and Reading Practices.”

Readers will note that They Were All Together in One Place? and “Mistaken Identities but Model Faith” were published in 2009 and 2004, respectively. Professor Liew's more recent works reflect similar lines of thought. For instance, the 2016 essay, “The Gospel of Bare Life,” describes obedience to God as “troubling” and “infantilizing.” Professor Liew writes, “If John’s Jesus, as well as those who follow John’s Jesus, are supposed to be fully subjected to the will of the Father to the point of death (6:35–64; 10:1–18; 15:1–16:4; 21:15–19), then are we not back to a scenario in which a Caesar-like head sits comfortably in a choice seat and watches bare life performing death for his purposes and his enjoyment?” (Source 12).

Professor Liew is often responsible for teaching “New Testament,” the College’s primary New Testament class. Its course description lists three texts: The HarperCollins Study Bible; The New Testament: A Historical Introduction to the Early Christian Writings, by Bart Ehrman; and The Gospel of Mary of Magdala: Jesus and the First Woman Apostle, by Harvard Divinity School professor Karen King. In addition to this class, Professor Liew has also taught “Sex, Money, Power, and Sacred Texts” and “Apocalyptic Then and Now,” according to the College’s student registration website.

Professor Liew’s unconventional readings of Scripture has brought a new theological perspective to Holy Cross. The position and prestige which accompany an endowed chair in Religious Studies testify to the esteem in which his work is held by the College’s administration and academic community. He continues to be held up as an example and a bold successor to the learned and discerning tradition of our Catholic and Jesuit College of the Holy Cross.

Notes

1. https://www.holycross.edu/departments/publicaffairs/hcm/2009_01Winter.pdf (page 12)

2. https://web.archive.org/web/20130623015854/https://psr.edu/tat-siong-benny-liew-0

3. https://news.holycross.edu/blog/2013/10/01/holy-cross-hires-13-new-faculty-members-for-2013-14-academic-year/ and https://www.holycross.edu/academics/programs/religious-studies/faculty/tat-siong-benny-liew

4. Theodore Jennings and Tat-siong Benny Liew, “Mistaken Identities but Model Faith: Rereading the Centurion, the Chap, and the Christ in Matthew 8:5-13,” Journal of Biblical Literature 123, no. 3 (2004): 491.

5. Tat-siong Benny Liew, “Queering Closets and Perverting Desires: Cross-Examining John’s Engendering and Transgendering Word across Different Worlds,” in They Were All Together in One Place: Toward Minority Biblical Criticism, ed. Randall C. Bailey, Tat-siong Benny Liew, and Fernando F. Segovia (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2009), 253-254.

6. Ibid., 257.

7. Ibid.

8. Ibid., 259-260.

9. Ibid., 278.

10. Ibid., 260.

11. Ibid., 265-266.

12. Tat-siong Benny Liew, “The Gospel of Bare Life,” in Psychoanalytic Mediations Between Marxist and Postcolonial Readings of the Bible, ed. Tat-siong Benny Liew and Erin Runions (Atlanta: SBL Press, 2016), 160-161.

Burial

April 6, 2016. During the monumental construction of Holy Cross’ new Luth Athletic Complex, much-extolled for its heft and grandeur, a time capsule is exhumed. As the Luth absorbs the Hart Center, a steel box is lifted from the latter’s dusty brick rubble. The ideals, memories, and relics of the College’s 1975-1976 students and faculty lie in a worker’s hands. The capsule is opened. Nestled inside is an assortment of memorabilia: copies of the Catholic Free Press, the Worcester Telegram, the Evening Gazette, the Crusader, and Crossroads. An American Revolution bicentennial medal and flag. Mementos from Rev. Francis J. Hart, S.J., and a newspaper article about his dear friend Will Jenks ’54. A letter regarding scheduling intramural basketball. A St. Ignatius Loyola Fundator Society of Jesus token. 

And lastly, a “beaded necklace” with images of Christ and the Virgin Mary. Catholics call it a Rosary. 

We do not know whose words those were. We do not know on whose account the misprint stole onto the pages of the Holy Cross Alumni magazine. What we do know is a much more sobering fact: that here at the College of the Holy Cross, there are individuals so estranged from the College’s Catholic identity and Jesuit charism that they do not know what a rosary is. The College, of course, doesn’t force prayer on its students; not one person must slide beads across his fingers out of some enforced necessity. But the problem is not that we have non-Catholic students. Rather, the real question is one of presence; one would expect that, in a Catholic institution, one of the most powerful prayers in existence would be visibly displayed on campus. If not that, we should at least recognize that the beads are used in prayer—not in fashion. There is no reason our faith needs to lie hidden. 

The misidentification tells us something, like the rest of the objects in the box. Consider the values of faith, history, and patriotism that so many at the College seem to be willing to abandon in the rubble. 

The time capsule also contained a copy of the Catholic Free Press, which, in 1975, must have merited value as an emblem of our faith. It was, after all, buried with the cornerstone of the Hart Center. Yet now, over forty years later, it would be bewildering to see a student know what the Catholic Free Press is, much less actually read it. The newspapers usually stand nearly untouched on the newspaper rack in Smith Hall, every-so-often picked at by students who, like winter fowl searching for nourishment, peck and decide that their worth is barren. The St. Ignatius token would have represented the spiritual legacy of St. Ignatius within the Catholic Church; the two were then inseparable. Now? It stands for a nebulous “Jesuit mission.” 

The copy of Crossroads accompanying its peers represents the gradual decay of our history. Among the undergraduate body, it has obtained no legacy here; perhaps graduates know it became the current Holy Cross Alumni magazine. And, over the impending years, the same may be said for the Crusader. Its name has been abandoned, buried by the Spire. One must wonder whether this noteworthy change will leave its predecessor swallowed up by the irrepressible gullet of time. 

The commemorative bicentennial flag and medal of the American Revolution represent another withering ideal: patriotism. In a college so vehemently concerned with social justice, which often takes the form of a double-edged sword - lacerating the faults of some to bolster the worth of others - patriotism shrivels like a dying vine. “He isn’t my President.” “Crooked Hillary.” The claim “I appreciate the United States for the opportunities it has offered me” is rarely made here. Perhaps that respect had roots here forty years ago, but there is little reason to expect a 250-year-anniversary commemoration of the Revolution in 2026. 

That time capsule represented the loyalties of an earlier Holy Cross: an inheritance of Catholicism within a Jesuit charism, history, patriotism. Thus passes the glory of the world. But, within a small scheduling letter, we find something the College has managed to retain: its concern for greater athletic community. We have, at least, accomplished that much. The Luth Athletic Complex will serve over a quarter of the student body with unwavering commitment and presents itself as a source of community pride. We shall, at least, excel in athletics. 

But since the Hart Center was built, how far have we come—or how far have we fallen? Does Catholicism still provide a thorough basis for the College’s decisions on the executive level? How much do our current undergraduates actually know about the history of the College? Is there still an underlying love for our country beneath our breath? Unfortunately, these questions cannot be easily answered with statistics and surveys. They embody a greater crisis in our very nature as an institution. And they must not, like our faith and devotion, lie buried. 

Emblazoned on the side of the Luth Athletic Complex is a massive cross, shamelessly on high for all to see. At night, it glows a radiant purple, shedding light over the campus and letting its presence be known in the city of Worcester. We aren’t afraid to show the religious tradition of Holy Cross; we need to find the courage to live it. 

"To Take the Risks of Love": an Interview with R. R. Reno

Dr. Reno is the editor of First Things, America’s largest journal of Religion and public life. He holds a Doctorate in Religious Ethics from Yale University, and was for 20 years a professor of Theology and Ethics at Creighton University.  This interview was conducted on September 21st, in connection with Dr. Reno’s lecture, “A Christian Interpretation of the Age of Trump.”  It has been edited for length.

Claude Hanley: What would be, in your estimation, the place of the university in American life now, and what should its task be?

R.R. Reno: Well, the purpose of the university is to provide a community of learning, it’s a place for the formation of a secular society that is committed to the life of the mind, and then obviously most students go on to professional work.  Most don’t become professors, but the educational experience serves as a leaven in society at large. I think especially on Josef Pieper’s wonderful short book Leisure, The Basis of Culture.  The American idea of the four-year liberal arts degree is of a time in your life when you’re not actually pursuing professional activities, but leaves you with something that’s closer to contemplative. Pieper argued that is actually necessary to have culture.

Now our view about the role of the university in the public square is shaped by the fact that after World War II, with the GI Bill, there was a big upsurge in college enrollments. And for the men that were coming back from World War II, the university became a kind of place where they looked at questions about what kind of society they were going to have. Consequently, we have this false view that the university is this kind of crucial place where the future of our society is debated and formed and shaped. I think that that’s distorted. It’s obviously true for some of our universities, but we overemphasize that because of the 50’s and 60’s, when we saw this sort of new, emerging middle class, different people from ethnic backgrounds being integrated into America’s leadership. Universities were the focal point for that process.  So universities would ideally be more nourishing, and less political than they are today.

CH: How do the humanities disciplines contribute to that mission?

RRR: Well, I’d put it more broadly, as the liberal arts. I mean, studying astrophysics doesn’t serve any practical purpose. It’s not clear studying evolutionary biology serves a practical purpose either.  Fossil records, all these sorts of things, contribute to our knowledge of the natural world, which we can perhaps use technically at some point.  Mathematicians also, they’re famous for coming up with things that have no relevance whatsoever, and then a hundred years later, people discover practical uses for their mathematical models. But it’s the wonder and joy of knowing that precedes their practical usefulness. And that’s a liberal education; it’s for its own sake, and not for some other end. That strikes me as what is so important about a liberal arts education.  We are made to know, and it is an intrinsic good to know truth.  Not every project can offer that; the liberal arts humanize us, and they make use more fully human.

CH: How does that humanization translate to society and to politics?

RRR: Whether it’s Shakespeare or astrophysics, you go out into the public square, if you’re liberally educated, and you’re less likely to be swept up in a thousand ideologies of the time. It gives you a kind of independence of mind.  I think it’s important, in any society, that you have people who have this independence of mind. John Henry Newman referred to education leads to an enlargement of mind.  You become more capacious…capable of grappling with a full range of experience. I don’t want to privilege the humanities in this regard.  I started out in physics as an undergraduate. My sister’s a physics professor at the University of Iowa. You have to specialize, you can’t know everything. It’s not like you’re swallowing all this food until your gut gets full and distended. It’s not just the amount of facts.  Instead, it’s developing a kind of mental plasticity, and flexibility, and a capacity that prompts you to think about things in such ways.

CH: It’s said that there is a lack of intellectual diversity, of that independence of thought in universities today. The same people are promoting the same kinds of ideas that are getting preeminence. Do you think that’s a valid criticism of the American university?

RRR: I don’t like to use this new term diversity here. We should have diversity of some things and we should have unity of other things. So, I think it’s not a cure-all. But there is a problem, it seems, where there isn’t independence of thought, there’s too much group think. And I don’t think it’s a matter of, as people often say, “Well, it’s because all the professors are liberals.” Now, I went to a small liberal arts college, not unlike Holy Cross.  The professors were ninety percent registered Democrats, they were certainly liberals.  But it didn’t feel like an environment that was closed or limited. To be capacious, to encourage adventure, to have the security as a faculty member to accept the fact that sometimes your students will go in a different direction -- These are qualities that I think that one hopes for in a faculty, but I see less of them today. It could be that the problem is not lack of diversity, but a kind of careerism on the part of faculty.  Or perhaps people want a cheap emotional payoff of feeling that their work has a great moral and political significance.  As a result, there’s a kind of works-righteousness around our salvation, at least our secular salvation by making sure that our  classes teach the right political lessons. I think we need to dig more deeply.  It’s not just a lack of diversity. That’s a symptom, not a cause.

CH: So, to continue this theme, one of the main challenges now is academic freedom and freedom of speech. I think of the events at Middlebury last year, and similar controversies.  What do you think at least some of the underlying issues are that cause this sort of tension?

RRR: Our society is very divided. Grownups don’t tell young people what life is for, and they’ve rebelled.   Everything is open, you choose your own values, et cetera et cetera.  I think it’s quite natural that students want to find some consensus and stability. The radical schools that want to shut down who they perceive to be bad people, I think are misguided.  But that may not be an altogether unhealthy desire, that they need right and wrong. So, I think we’re seeing these perverse dysfunctions in education because we the grownups have created that need.  It’s being filled by some sort of ideological, imposed consensus, rather than a real, genuine consensus.

CH: And this critique reaches back to the same idea, that we’ve lost the ability to pursue the human good?

RRR: Right. If we’re concerned about academic freedom and free speech (and we should be concerned about these things), we need to be clear about what the education at the institution is for, and why shouting people down harms the proper end of education. We’re a community of inquiry.  In a community of inquiry, if people can’t speak, in that sense there’s an imposed consensus, and there’s not a lot of inquiry any more. I’ve talked with young people, and they’ve told me that they find more and more, that it’s just wise not to say what’s on their minds. It’s too dangerous. Well, how can you make progress in the pursuit of truth if you can’t articulate what you think the truth is, and hear what others have to say in response? The problem with shutting down speakers is that it impedes us in achieving the end of education, which is to refine our ideas and make them more in accord with the truth. So I don’t think that academic freedom is an end in itself, it needs to be the means to the end -- having a healthy medium of inquiry. I don’t think that Holy Cross should invite a creationist to give lectures. It just doesn’t help advance the pursuit of truth.  You and I can come up with examples where “no, that’s not going to help.” The problem again is that then the sort of ideological frame of mind comes into play.  It’s a crazy view that the political opinions of half the country are taboo. How could any reasonable person think that? It’s irrational.

CH:  So we have to balance academic freedom with a duty to truth.  What duty to truth does a Catholic university in particular have, and how should it be balanced against academic freedom?

RRR: I think that a Catholic university has an absolute duty to teach what the Catholic Church teaches. A Catholic university that does not teach that which the Church teaches is not betraying its Catholic identity; it’s betraying its identity as a University. The purpose of a university is to encourage people to pursue the truth, and also to transmit the truth. And we believe, as Catholics, that what the Church teaches truths that are indispensable, not just for our salvation but also for our fuller understanding of the human condition. There’s a question of priorities. It’s not the job of the Catholic university to represent all possible views of what it means to be human; It is absolutely the responsibility to propose to students, and to the world, that the Church teaches what it means to be human. That entails defining priorities: hiring priorities, what kind of courses to acquire, etc. It’s not a violation of academic freedom to say that Catholic theology is required, but a Jewish Studies professor’s course is not required. It’s not a violation of academic freedom; that’s the institution establishing its priorities.   Nor is it a violation of academic freedom for the university not to invite speakers who hold positions contrary to what the Church teaches. Now there could be student groups or others who want to invite those people.  Then the university has to make a judgement about whether it harms the mission of the university, which is to transmit and encourage students to pursue the truth. In many cases, Catholic universities have confidence in their own students. If it is doing what it should be, which is to ensure Catholic teaching is clearly taught, it can tolerate dissent quite easily.

CH: How does that concern influence the other disciplines, outside of philosophy and theology?

RRR: It applies across the board. For instance, one problem we have is that in the sciences, there’s often a materialistic metaphysics that’s operating very close to the surface: that our brains are our minds, and we’re just neurons firing. A university should guard against teaching this. It’s scientism, it’s not science. The same goes for economics.  Economics is a powerful and important discipline that teaches us to think in a critical way about markets.  It models the human behavior in terms of maximizing authority, where that’s understood as maximizing one’s material interest. That’s fine for modelling, but it easily can lead to a generalization that humans are nothing more than utility maximizing achievements. That’s not true for the human person either. So in many different disciplines, there needs to be reflection on how we as an institution can present our view of the human person. Pope Benedict’s Regensburg speech dealt with that.

CH: Are there any particular reforms you think should be made, or is it more a change in attitude toward the project of the University?

RRR: I think Catholic universities really need to get a grip on the hiring of faculty. We’ve spent too many decades now trying to imitate secular higher education. We need to return to the wisdom of our own tradition, and recognize that the metaphysical poverty of our time is quite acute, and we need to focus on hiring people, not the people who all agree, that’s absurd, you’re never going to find that [laughs], that’s the whole idea. You can’t even find Thomists who agree. It’s not a question of agreement, it’s a question of whether or not there are faculty members who believe that there’s truth, and that truth transcends a particular discipline. In Pope Benedict’s Regensburg speech, he looked back with nostalgia on his years at Regensburg, when faculty members often would gather together and try to talk about the big questions, transcending the specialized knowledge that they had in philosophy or theology or science or literature or history. One has to grope towards these larger theories together, and we have to hire professors who are committed to try to do that together. That’s what it means to be liberal, not having a collection of specialists.  And I think because the Catholic Church opposes a compromise of truth about the human person, both as to our manifold destiny in God, as well as to our natural duties and responsibilities, and because it presents a comprehensive vision of the human person, we in particular have an inheritance that allows us to recognize the poverty of our present age. We should address that poverty by building institutions that pursue a larger vision.

FR: But that would entail first recognizing our inheritance.

RRR: Right.  Catholic universities have a natural excellence of the life of the mind. Most of what goes on at Catholic universities functions in the area of the natural virtues -- intellectual integrity, intellectual honesty and intellectual zeal. This is encouraged and elevated by the supernatural virtue of faith, but these are natural virtues. It’s possible that we can draw upon educational models and experiences at secular universities. It’s not that we only have to hire people with degrees from Catholic universities, etc., etc. But it does require a kind of recognition that higher education in the United States is not in good shape. We see this from this dysfunctional campus environments. And because it’s not in good shape, consequently we should not just be imitating what other, elite, universities are doing.  We should be returning to our sources and asking ourselves, “What is it that the Catholic tradition proposes as a vision of the Truth?”

FR: In conclusion, what piece of advice would you give undergraduates about how to take their four years of undergraduate education?

RRR: Don’t worry about what comes next. Bill Deresiewicz, who wrote a book called Excellent Sheep about today’s college students, said that there are two religions that dominate higher education today. One is a religion of political correctness, and the other is a religion of success. Both of those religions actually feed on each other, because political correctness is a way of baptizing a person to success. So I would say that success is a far more powerful god than political correctness. So beware of that idol. Study the things you love.  One of the great poverties of our age is that it really is a loveless age. People don’t feel that they even have permission to take the risks of love. If you love physics, study physics. If you love theology, study theology. Don’t worry about what you’re going to do for a living right now.  In the United States, we have society set up for people to do well. We don’t have a society set up for people to cultivate the life of the mind. Cultivate it now, and it will carry you through many of life’s difficulties and setbacks, which are inevitable even if you are successful.

Letter to the Editors: November 2017

To the Editors of The Fenwick Review, 

Here are a few thoughts on Father Mulledy, the mascot change, and Catholicism at the College. 

I would think that the Lord’s advice still applies: He who is without sin, let him cast the first stone.” Father Mulledy was a good man, true to his Faith, untiring worker in the field of Catholic education and, by all accounts, successful in what he tried. Look at the many priestly vocations he helped inspire among graduates. Look at the institution he helped found. Was he sinless? Did he make the right decisions in all cases? No. He was a man of his times as today’s Jesuits are men of their times. Slavery was accepted in the environment in which he worked, accepted by many of his contemporary bishops, priests and parishioners and an evil over which he certainly had no control. He was mistaken but he did what he thought he had to do at the time. 

As for retaining the “Crusader” name and mascot, perhaps today’s Holy Cross College should drop both. It certainly would be consistent with the recent discussion regarding the elimination of the “cross” symbol from the Holy Cross logo. And, too, it would be consistent with that “mission statement” we are so concerned about; There’s no mention of Christ or His Cross in that either. A “Crusader”, after all, is one concerned about the cross of Christ, concerned to the extent of being willing to fight and die for that cross. The current college is ashamed to show it in print. The whole issue is a dramatic reflection of the state to which the Jesuit administration and the Holy Cross board have brought the college—a politically correct, semi-Catholic institution that frequently weakens the faith of its graduates. New building galore, a rich man’s tuition and plenty of money in the bank but woefully inept at accomplishing the real mission of the college: graduating well educated men and women who are strong in their faith and who are dedicated to promoting the love of Christ and His Church throughout their lives. 

Daniel J. Gorman ‘54

Some Discernment on Spirits

When people from back home (I’m from the Midwest) find out I go to a school named Holy Cross, they assume that here on the Hill, we all like to spend our Friday nights praying the Rosary. They think that since it’s a Catholic school, there isn’t a lot of partying. That’s perpetuated when they hear that (allegedly) 40% of students say they don’t drink. Now I haven’t been on campus that long, but I know that number is either false or the other 60% drink enough to make up for the abstainers. So yes, here at Holy Cross, contrary to what many Midwesterners assume, we enjoy our drink. But this line of thought exposes a very real misconception: that there’s a contradiction between Church teaching and drinking alcohol. There isn’t. 

Take the word of G.K. Chesterton, apologist, poet, and Catholic literary giant, who once said, “In Catholicism, the pint, the pipe, and the Cross can all fit together.” He compared the Catholic Church to a thick steak, a cigar, and a glass of red wine. Then there’s St. Thomas Aquinas, a Doctor of the Church, who not only supported drinking, but believed alcohol should be used to “cheer men’s souls” and that we should “drink to the point of hilarity.” The Catechism of the Catholic Church has no opposition to the use of alcohol, tobacco, or gambling in moderation. Jesus’s first miracle was turning water into wine -- and he didn’t use grape juice at the Last Supper. And last but not least, the Trappist monks make the best beer in the world -- or so I’m told. 

But before you grab the keg, it’s also important to note that Aquinas--the one who recommended drinking to cope with sadness--also said that being drunk is a mortal sin. As a Catholic College, where we embrace the cross and the pint, it’s critical to discuss the intersection of morality and mischief that comes with drinking. At first glance, Aquinas’s classification of drunkenness as a mortal sin may seem a little extreme. But then Aquinas, in all his wisdom, points out that when we drink, we occasionally do stupid things. And to think - Thomas Aquinas figured that out even though he had no idea what a darty was. 

But it’s true. So many people say that alcohol can get rid of your inhibitions, but is that honestly a good thing?

If my inhibitions keep me from doing something stupid - like streaking, for example - then I think society should be all the more grateful that I’m inhibited. To top it off, we also live in a society where people post random and inappropriate things online while sober. Spend five minutes on Tumblr and you’ll agree that inhibition is not society’s greatest threat. But even then, Aquinas says, drunkenness may be a reason for sin, but it’s not an excuse. Coming back to the streaking example, the real issue isn’t me being drunk, it’s that I’m running naked across the Hoval. 

So if we just don’t do anything stupid while drunk… we should be good, right? No. The real danger, according to Aquinas, is the “drinking to get drunk” mentality that permeates American college campuses. He says it’s a mortal sin if a man drinks with the conviction that “he would rather be drunk than abstain from drink.” Now -- Aquinas isn’t arguing that wanting to be drunk is a sin. If that were the case, everyone who’d ever sat through Freshman Convocation should go to confession. Drunkenness gets sinful when we knowingly and happily choose inebriation over sobriety. There are a couple good reasons for this. For one, it’s gluttony. If you sit down and eat three pizzas, you may have a problem. If you sit down and drink a fifth of Svedka, same goes. On top of that, you destroy your body. But it gets seriously problematic when is when we drink to get sloppy drunk, because in doing so, we knowingly give up human reason, and in turn, reject our God-given human dignity. 

It loops back to the inhibition thing, but in a deeper way. When we drink so much we can’t make a rational decision or walk in a straight line, we’ve essentially become toddlers or very, very large squirrels. Human reason is a gift from God. It’s part of the mystery of salvation history -- that we can use reason as a way to discover and choose the things that lead us closer to -- or further away from -- God. When we drink to get drunk, we essentially decide to “turn off” the rational brains that God gave us. We are no longer in a position to love, reverence and serve God. It’s not just about avoiding stupidity, it’s about safeguarding and reverencing our God-given dignity. 

The issue is not that we drink on Friday night. Or Saturday night. Or maybe even Saturday during the day. Or Wednesday. Or Thursday. (As a classic Irish folk song says, “I only drink on the days that end in y.”) The issue is that when we drink, we pee on lawns. We dehumanize ourselves. Drinking to loosen up isn’t problematic- it’s a foreshadow of heaven and it can help us be the person God calls us to be. But when we get drunk, we’re not the best, most loving version of ourselves. Instead of “Men and Women for and With Others,” we become “Men and Women Puking on Others.” We can’t focus on God- we can barely walk straight. And when we choose to get obliterated, hammered, sloshed, schmizzed, totally tuckered or absolutely blitzed, we choose that over God. We say, “Tonight’s about me.” 

So with Aquinas, Augustine (a patron saint of beer), the Trappists, Chesterton, and even Jesus, let’s raise our cups (in moderation) for the love and the glory of God. Hillaire Belloc might have put it best -- “Wherever the Catholic sun doth shine, there’s always laughter and good red wine. At least, I’ve always found it so -- Benedicamus Domino!”