Judging by D. Pierce Nixon’s column (“GU’s Catholic Identity Means More Than Blind Submission,” www.thehoya.com, March 25, 2008), it would seem that he either has incredible Vatican sources, or the gift of prophecy, for he criticizes a papal speech that has neither been delivered nor released to the general public. Nixon claims that Pope Benedict wants all students at Catholic universities to “blindly” accept Christian dogma. Indeed, he tells us that “If the Newman Society and Benedict had their way, there would be no ‘why,’ only a ‘because.’”

If the Holy Father expresses such a position in his speech at Catholic University in three weeks, it will be a monumental break from everything he has advocated in the past, both as a theologian and as the pope. To illustrate this, I offer a quote from a lecture that the Holy Father was to give at La Sapienza University in Rome in January. He was prevented from delivering it in person by anti-Catholic protestors. “What should the Pope do or say at the university? Certainly, he must not seek to impose the faith upon others in an authoritarian manner — as faith can only be given in freedom … It is the Pope’s task to safeguard sensibility to the truth; to invite reason to set out ever anew in search of what is true and good, in search of God.” The Panzer Pope strikes again!

Joe Zwosta (COL ’07)
March 26, 2008