November 6, 2015 (CardinalNewmanSociety) — Boston College, a Jesuit, Catholic institution, hosted an event on campus Wednesday featuring former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, a known public advocate for legal abortion, despite the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ (USCCB) policy and instruction that “those who act in defiance of our fundamental moral principles” should not be given “awards, honors or platforms which would suggest support for their actions.”
The event, the first “Colloquium” organized by the Boston College alumni group Council for Women of Boston College, promoted Albright as an “exceptional thought leader” for considering “contemporary issues through the lens of women’s leadership.”
“I am thrilled to be here, and deeply honored to be the first speaker at the colloquium,” Albright reportedly said.
As The Cardinal Newman Society previously reported, Albright supports legal abortion. In her 2007 book The Mighty and the Almighty: Reflections on America, God and World Affairs, Albright confirmed, “I am a supporter of Roe v.Wade because I think women should have the right to choose.” In 2004 she was featured at the “March for Women’s Rights” in Washington, D.C., which rallied support for legalized abortion. And she has called the Mexico City Policy, which prohibited U.S. tax dollars from funding abortions overseas, “undemocratic.”
In 2004, the USCCB issued the document Catholics in Political Life that stated, “The Catholic community and Catholic institutions should not honor those who act in defiance of our fundamental moral principles. They should not be given awards, honors or platforms which would suggest support for their actions.”
Additionally, Ex corde Ecclesiae, the apostolic constitution on Catholic universities,states that “Catholic teaching and discipline are to influence all university activities … Any official action or commitment of the University is to be in accord with its Catholic identity.”
The Newman Society reached out to Boston College to explain, in light of Albright’s known public support for abortion, how the College justifies hosting her on campus considering the USCCB’s 2004 statement on giving honors and platforms to those in opposition to Church teaching and the provisions of Ex corde Ecclesiae.
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The Newman Society further asked if hosting Albright, or other known supporters of abortion, in such a prominent way on campus hurts the College’s Catholic identity.
No comment from Boston College was received by time of publication.
Boston College’s Catholic identity came under fire recently after Canadian writer Dorothy Cummings McLean published an essay on The Catholic World Report saying her time as a theology student at the College beginning in 2005 was “two of the most miserable years of my life.”
Reacting to the list of professors who signed a letter to the New York Times on October 26 criticizing columnist Ross Douthat’s lack of theological credentials, McLean wrote about signers from Boston College:
As the Affair Douthat unfolds, I keep attaching faces to the names I hadn’t heard or seen for many years. One of them belongs to an active homosexual who brought his boyfriend along on the departmental retreat and shared a room with him. Another belongs to an active unmarried heterosexual who brought his girlfriend along on the departmental retreat and shared a room with her. They were both very pleasant and cheerful men.
“I liked them very much—which does not erase the facts that they did not believe the teaching of the Catholic Church concerning sexual morality and that today they are professional Catholic theologians,” she said.
Reprinted with permission from The Cardinal Newman Society.