10 Ways Catholic Education and Critical Race Theory Are Incompatible

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Today America continues to struggle with the consequences of the terrible sin of slavery and the injustice of racism. With confidence in Christ, Catholic education teaches God’s will for humanity and helps students rise above hatred and injustice. But critical race theory promotes a false political ideology that aims to divide rather than heal American society.

The following are 10 ways Catholic education and critical race theory are simply incompatible, summarized from the Newman Society’s Principles of Catholic Identity, Catholic Curriculum Standards and “Background on Critical Race Theory and Critical Theory for Catholic Educators” by Dr. Denise Donohue.

  1. Catholic education teaches from the truths of our faith and Christian anthropology. But critical race theory is a political, divisive ideology that is antithetical to the Catholic worldview.
  2. Catholic education teaches the dignity of all people, made in the image and likeness of God. But critical race theory has its origins in critical theory, a Marxist inspired movement that views all things through the lens of power and divides society into oppressors and the oppressed. Critical race theory marks this division according to racial lines.
  3. Charity and community are central to the mission of Catholic education. But critical race theory promotes division and forces people into competing racial groups.
  4. Catholic education conforms consciences to Christ and His Church. But critical race theory imputes unconscious bias upon persons and deems racism a permanent condition.
  5. Catholic education teaches that sin is an individual fault that can have devastating social impact. But critical race theory imputes guilt for “social sins” committed in the past.
  6. Catholic education teaches the unity of faith and reason and helps students know and live the truth. But critical race theory is skeptical of objective truth and rejects the Western intellectual tradition. It places individual experience and cultural constructivism over reason.
  7. Catholic education recognizes individual autonomy and cultivates students’ capacity for reason, without regard to skin color. But critical race theory assumes that race defines how one thinks and looks at the world.
  8. Catholic education observes human accomplishments and failings according to a Catholic worldview, by which racism is one element of a fallen and redeemed nature. But critical race theory demands that history be taught through the lens of race, power and privilege.
  9. Catholic education favors literature that promotes understanding of the human condition across time and culture. But critical race theory demands that classic texts be set aside for contemporary literature that is narrowly focused on race and social deconstruction.
  10. Catholic education respects the natural and religious rights of parents to direct the formation of their children in collaboration with the school. But critical race theory manipulates education to form children according to its narrow ideology and to reshape culture.

10 Ways Catholic Education Counters ‘Cancel Culture’

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Catholic education is different: its mission is rooted in the truth and salvific mission of the Catholic Church, and it forms young people for sainthood. When addressing sensitive topics—like race or sexuality—Catholic education must never shy away from the truth about man and God. Truth is the foundation of charity and community.

The following are 10 ways a faithful Catholic education counters the toxic “cancel culture” and false ideology, summarized from the Newman Society’s Principles of Catholic Identity, Catholic Curriculum Standards and “Catholic Education’s Call in the Face of ‘Cancel Culture’” by Dr. Dan Guernsey and Dr. Denise Donohue.

1) Embraces a Catholic worldview, where faith and culture enrich and speak to each other. Always leads with Jesus, “the inexhaustible source of personal and communal perfection.”

2) Uses faithfully Catholic materials, always wary of speakers, materials, and programs that deny Catholic teaching, promote division, blame one particular group or culture for all the ills of humanity, seek vengeance, or stifle free speech and religious freedom.

3) Relates discussions to a Catholic understanding of the human person through a clear and convincing Christian anthropology. Affirms human creation by God as male or female and the union of body and spirit, as well as the common humanity and destiny of all peoples as originating with God and part of His design.

4) Relates discussions to Catholic social teaching, including the dignity of all persons, the sacredness of human life, the sanctity of marriage and its importance to human society and human fraternity amid national, racial, ethnic, economic, gender, and ideological differences.

5) Helps students discover the religious dimension in human history. Compares the actions of peoples according to Catholic morality and virtues but also the level of development of a person or culture and the conditions, knowledge, and understanding of the time.

6) Teaches students to analyze the morality of human acts, including separating the sin and the sinner. Helps them properly attribute degrees of culpability based on individual awareness and freedom, not generalizations about group behaviors. Affirms the possibly of repentance and forgiveness.

7) Teaches logic and reason to uncover objective truth, especially when emotions run hot. Promotes dialogue not for its own sake, but as a means of pursuing truth and unity.

8) Teaches Catholic values and concepts of charity, forgiveness, mercy, justice, and the common good. Shuns sins of calumny, pride, detraction, and rash judgment. Carefully selects music, art, movies, and literature to develop empathy, helping students enter into another’s suffering without directly experiencing it.

9) Avoids compounding tension and division, especially by the use of loaded language. Avoids politically charged terms and symbols that lack nuance, have distinct meanings for different people, promote an “all in” approach to complex social flashpoints, or emphasize conflict or political power. Carefully defines terms within a Catholic context and vocabulary.

10) Avoids replacing academic pursuits with activism and allowing curricula to be driven by the news cycle. Does not force students into protests, compel them to identify with morally ranked categories, or require activities to make them feel the pain of discrimination.

Statement from the Cardinal Newman Society on 7th Circuit Ruling in Demkovich v. St. Andrew the Apostle Paris

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In a very important victory today for religious freedom, the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled 7-3 in Demkovich v. St. Andrew the Apostle Parish (July 9, 2021) that the ministerial exception bars “hostile work environment” claims.

The U.S. Supreme Court has not yet ruled directly on this point, so the 7th Circuit’s decision is extremely important to Catholic educators and other religious employers.

“This ruling protects faithful Catholic educators and other religious employers from at least some lawsuits, which is especially helpful given the relentless drive to redefine sex discrimination as prohibiting Catholic beliefs about sex, gender and marriage,” said Patrick Reilly, President of The Cardinal Newman Society. “The ministerial exception helps preserve the authentic mission of Catholic educators and all religious organizations.”

The Cardinal Newman Society is excited to have played an important role in the case, filing an amicus brief last October that was prepared by Christian Poland of the Chicago firm Bryan Cave Leighton Paisner LLP and John Bursch and Rory Gray of Alliance Defending Freedom. The brief helped persuade the full 7th Circuit Court to reconsider and overturn a dangerous 2-1 decision by a panel of the court’s judges, which would have allowed employees fired for moral reasons to work around the ministerial exception by claiming a “hostile workplace” instead of directly challenging their firing.

Today’s ruling comes almost exactly one year after the Supreme Court’s historic ruling in Our Lady of Guadalupe School v. Agnes Morrissey-Berru (July 8, 2020), which found that the ministerial exception includes Catholic school religion teachers. The Supreme Court protected Catholic schools and colleges from at least some discrimination lawsuits based on conflicts with Catholic moral teaching, but the 7th Circuit panel ruling would have greatly undermined the authority of religious schools, colleges and other organizations over ministerial employees.

The panel decision could have put Catholic education in an “untenable position,” the Newman Society warned in our amicus brief:

“A Catholic school has freedom to hire and fire ministers based on alignment with the Catholic Church’s religious teachings about sex, sexual orientation, and marriage. But if a Catholic school minister engages in a course of conduct that violates the Catholic Church’s teachings, and the school persistently communicates that the minister has strayed from the school’s moral expectations and should repent, the school can now be forced to endure a secular trial.”

The full 7th Circuit Court’s ruling strongly rejects the panel’s opinion and reaffirms the rights of religious employers with regard to ministerial employees.

A Crucial Line of Defense for Catholic Education

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Catholic education could face severe hardships should the religious protection that is built into Title IX — the federal law banning sex discrimination — be taken away. And that is exactly what some activists and the Biden administration hopeto do.

The Administration and some federal courts now interpret Title IX as a ban on teaching and upholding authentic gender, sexuality and marriage. But since the law was first enacted in 1972, Title IX has exempted religious schools and colleges from any application of the law that conflicts with their religious beliefs. Predictably, LGBT activists are now striving to undo that exemption.

For Catholics, it should be a top priority to hold that line. It doesn’t mean that we should focus only on exempting religion from bad laws while our culture collapses. But ultimately winning the culture war requires that we form young people in faith, reason and wisdom — all of which are in short supply today. I see no path to a renewal of the Church and culture without a renewal of faithful Catholic education.

We must carve out protection for Catholic education if we are ever to win the larger battle. If the religious exemption to Title IX falls, Catholic schools and colleges will probably fall also, and even Catholic homeschooling may be targeted. That’s because the impact will be felt far beyond restrictions on federal money for education, which is the trigger that subjects an institution to Title IX. Even more, a collapse of the Title IX religious exemption is likely to cascade into anti-Catholic bigotry in state law, accreditation, academic associations, athletic leagues, etc., until there is minimal tolerance for any form of truly Catholic education.

 

Lawsuits target exemption

Among the threats to the Title IX religious exemption are two lawsuits which are unlikely to succeed — but if they do, the consequences could be devastating.

One of the lawsuits seeks to exploit a narrow interpretation of the Title IX exemption itself. The exemption states that Title IX “shall not apply to an educational institution which is controlled by a religious organization, if the application of this subsection would not be consistent with the religious tenets of such organization.”

Two students who were expelled from Fuller Theological Seminary for violating rules against same-sex unions have asked the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to deny the seminary access to the Title IX exemption, because Fuller is nondenominational and independent of any organized religion. This, they argue, is not within the scope of institutions that are “controlled by a religious organization.”

The danger to Catholic education is enormous, should this argument prevail. Most Catholic colleges and many lay-established Catholic schools in the U.S. are not legally owned by the Church. They have independent boards of trustees that legally control the institutions. If the Title IX exemption is interpreted to exclude such independent operations, many of our Catholic schools and colleges as well as America’s nondenominational Christian institutions would no longer be protected.

Just last month, the Cardinal Newman Society and a number of faithful Catholic schools and colleges joined an amicus brief urging the Ninth Circuit to acknowledge that an institution controlled by a board of trustees that is committed to certain religious beliefs is, in fact, “controlled by a religious organization” for the purposes of Title IX. That is precisely how the U.S. Department of Education has always interpreted the exemption. The regulations implementing Title IX exempt any “educational institution [that] has a published institutional mission that is approved by the governing body of an educational institution and that includes, refers to, or is predicated upon religious tenets, beliefs, or teachings.”

But there’s another lawsuit that takes aim at the entire Title IX exemption. A group of students and alumni from various Christian colleges have filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Education, calling for the religious exemption in Title IX to be struck down as unconstitutional because, by protecting religious institutions, it creates an “establishment of religion.” This contradicts longstanding practice of the Education Department and religious exemptions throughout federal law.

 

Stand firm

If the religious exemption to Title IX were struck down, Catholic schools and colleges could be forced to give up federal aid and, much worse, face a growing number of legal and social obstacles that could render Catholic educators unable to promote and educate their students in the eternal truths of the Church, both moral and academic.

Meanwhile, the Biden administration is pursuing an end run around the Title IX exemption that could have similar consequences. By promoting the Equality Act — which was approved in the House and has been introduced in the Senate — the Administration has pinned its hopes on expanding the definition of discrimination under the separate Title VI and thereby opening the door to lawsuits and restrictions against religious education.

Catholic schools should be prepared to defend against these ever evolving and worrisome attacks on religious freedom. Courts have historically turned a kinder eye to institutions that maintain a sincere and consistent adherence to their professed moral beliefs. The best defense against these attacks, then, is for Catholic schools and colleges to consistently uphold the truths of the Church in their teaching, policies and activities.

The Church is used to weathering attacks. It has endured far worse than agenda-driven activists and lawyers seeking to overturn U.S. civil rights law. And recent court victories for religious freedom offer hope that the latest attacks will fail. But the attacks are worrisome nonetheless because of their direct opposition to religious freedom, and if they succeed, they could hurt thousands of Catholic families.

This article first appeared at the National Catholic Register.

‘Fulton’ Ruling Teaches Important Lesson to Catholic Educators

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A leading attorney for the defense of religious freedom says Catholic educators can learn an important lesson from the Supreme Court’s recent Fulton ruling, which allowed Catholic Social Services of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia to uphold its faithfully Catholic practices. The lesson: Have courage and stand firm in the Faith.

Like Catholic social and medical services, Catholic education faces growing threats from the Biden administration and many states and localities because of Catholic beliefs about the sanctity of life, the human person and marriage. While educators may be tempted to compromise on programs like women’s athletics or on policies like moral standards for teachers, doing so violates the very mission of Catholic education, and there is no escaping confrontation with gender ideology. The best legal protection is to be consistently and firmly committed to the Catholic faith.

“As Fulton shows, religious freedom is stronger when Catholic apostolates are standing in a long historical tradition and have the courage of their convictions,” says Eric Kniffin, legal adviser to The Cardinal Newman Society and attorney with Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie LLP. He also worked previously for the Becket Fund and the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.

“On the contrary,” he warns, “if Catholic schools disregard their calling and lose their saltiness, they will have a much harder time convincing students, parents and judges that they need religious accommodations.”

The Court’s June 17 ruling in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia protects the right of Catholic Social Services to continue receiving City of Philadelphia funding, without yielding to the City’s demand that it place children for foster care with same-sex couples. The Court’s deference to Catholic Social Services’ mission and beliefs, says Kniffin, is heartening given the Biden administration’s efforts to impose broad accommodations for homosexuality and transgender behavior in schools and colleges by twisting the nondiscrimination provisions of the federal Title IX education law.

Last Wednesday, the Biden administration released a “Dear Educator” letter insisting that “Title IX’s protection against sex discrimination encompasses discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity,” despite the fact that Congress never intended the law to have such a meaning. On Monday, the Court declined to consider a Virginia school board’s appeal to preserve the privacy of boys’ and girls’ bathrooms, leaving educators vulnerable to the Administration’s gender ideology.

The Education Department’s letter last week indicated that it expects schools and colleges to allow students to choose athletic teams based on their stated “gender identity” and give them access to the bathrooms and locker rooms of their choice. Moreover, the Department indicated that it would mandate what educators can believe and teach about sex, warning against a scenario in which “the teacher tells the class that there are only boys and girls and anyone who thinks otherwise has something wrong with them.”

Good for education

But the Fulton decision offers some hope of protection for religious education, to the extent that the Supreme Court respected Catholics’ right to uphold fundamental truths about human nature and sexuality.

“One of the most important victories for the Catholic Church in Fulton is that the Supreme Court voted unanimously in favor of a religious entity that believes that ‘marriage is a sacred bond between a man and a woman,’” Kniffin says. “Some on the left have argued that such a statement is akin to racial bigotry. The Court’s unanimous decision is a strong repudiation of that analogy.”

Instead, the Court remained consistent with its Obergefell ruling in 2015, which said, “Many who deem same-sex marriage to be wrong reach that conclusion based on decent and honorable religious or philosophical premises, and neither they nor their beliefs are disparaged here.”

In his majority opinion in Fulton, Chief Justice John Roberts took notice of the Catholic Church’s long history of serving children as an extension of its religious exercise, not apart from it. Catholic education is no different. This was a point that Kniffin made in the amicus brief he authored last year for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) and the Pennsylvania Catholic Conference.

“This history was important in the Fulton case, because the City and its allies claimed that foster care has now become a ‘public service,’ which means that the contracts at issue here had no more religious significance than contracts for ‘road maintenance,’” Kniffin explains. His brief for the USCCB noted that the Court had already rejected this line of argument with respect to Catholic education in the 2012 Hosanna-Tabor ruling, which affirmed the ministerial exception for certain Catholic school teachers. In that case, the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission made the outrageous argument that the First Amendment does not apply to Catholic schools providing a “socially beneficial service … in compliance with State compulsory education laws.”

Just as Hosanna-Tabor helped the Archdiocese of Philadelphia make its case, the Fulton ruling gives Catholic education an even stronger argument for religious freedom, Kniffin says. “While caring for orphans falls under the corporal works of mercy, the work of Catholic schools falls under the spiritual works of mercy. When carried out as the Catholic Church intends … Catholic schools are carrying out a core religious exercise.”

On the other hand, the Fulton ruling is also a reminder of how fragile such rights can be in today’s secular society. Although the Supreme Court had the opportunity with this case to overturn its 1990 ruling in Employment Services v. Smith, it avoided the issue, thereby allowing states and cities like Philadelphia to attempt further discrimination against Catholic organizations as long as their laws and rules are generally applicable without exceptions. Catholic Social Services may soon have to return to court to protect its foster care services and force a review of Smith— or that review might occur because of a case involving Catholic education, which faces challenges with licensing, school choice funding, accreditation, participation in athletic conferences and other state and local attempts to impose gender ideology despite Catholic beliefs.

“The good news is that five justices in Fulton said that they believe that the Free Exercise Clause protects more religious liberty than the Smith decision might indicate,” Kniffin says. “Hopefully, this consensus will help dissuade government from even stronger efforts to force Catholic schools to abandon their convictions on matters of sexual morality and the human person. But if they do, the Court seems poised to protect the First Amendment right to free exercise.”

As for federal programs like college student loans and aid for textbooks and busing, Catholic education is protected by the religious exemption in Title IX — except that the Biden administration wants to maneuver around that exemption with the harmful Equality Act. Activists are also attempting to dismantle the Title IX exemption in court. To counter their arguments, the Cardinal Newman Society recently joined an amicus brief with the Christian Legal Society, several groups representing various religious beliefs, and Catholic schools and colleges that are recognized by the Newman Society for their faithful education.

By standing firm and refusing to yield our religious freedom, Catholic educators can hopefully continue to win in court. Moreover, the formation that Catholic education provides young people — if it remains consistently faithful to the teachings of the Church — can eventually renew society and restore respect for truth.

This article first appeared at the National Catholic Register.

Reviving the Lost Art of Reading in Catholic Homes

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My family has always had an assortment of books around the house for our children, and now for our grandchildren as well. Fond memories recur when I hear the grandchildren squeal with delight, as they explore the vast new worlds opening before them.

Inspired by his fourth-grade cousin, the rising first-grader reads anything within reach, especially “chapter books” and stories of saints. His parents patiently clarify the words that are not yet within his vocabulary.

His younger sister is exuberant when she realizes she can form letters into words, and words into sentences. Curious George is one of her bedtime favorites.

The vast new world, contained between the covers of a book, stimulates the imagination of these young readers as they are drawn more deeply to seek the truth, beauty, and goodness of the world in which they live.

Unfortunately, this joy of reading is absent from many homes today. Jean Twenge, an academic psychologist who studies the iPhone generation (iGens), recently told the Wall Street Journal that, “The percentage of high-school students who read books or other long-form content every day has dropped from 60 percent to 15 percent since the 1980s.” This is attributed to “short attention spans,” given today’s emphasis on social media and general internet surfing.

Continue reading at The Catholic World Report…

U.S. Capitol

60 Pro-Abortion Congressmen Flunk Catholicism 101

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When 60 members of the House of Representatives — all of them baptized Catholics — issued their ultimatum last week demanding access to the Eucharist despite their pro-abortion politics, it became apparent how little they know about the Catholic faith and Christ’s invitation to communion with him.

The signers clearly hope to turn the bishops’ appeal for “Eucharistic coherency” into a partisan issue, even though it impacts Catholics of every political stripe. But regardless of which party these politicians belong to, what most concerns me is the fact that prominent Catholics displayed such ignorance of the Church’s fundamental teaching and practice concerning the Eucharist. Which made me wonder: how many attended Catholic schools and colleges?

In the past, I have lamented the number of pro-abortion members of Congress who graduated from Catholic colleges, mostly Jesuit institutions. Often they are celebrated as successful alumni, despite their flagrant opposition to the Church’s reverence for the sanctity of all human life.

The bewildering fact is that half of the 60 who signed last week’s letter received a Catholic education. Of those 30 representatives, at least 15 attended Catholic high schools and 22 attended Catholic colleges, 16 of them Jesuit institutions.

What does this say about Catholic education in recent decades? Perhaps these politicians received a good education and later turned away from the Faith — that certainly is possible. But given the abundance of evidence of the poor catechesis of Catholics, widespread dissent on abortion and contraception, and weak Catholic identity in many schools and colleges over the last five decades, the Church likely bears some responsibility for failing to properly form these men and women as saints instead of obstinate sinners.

On the other hand, the fact that 31 never had a Catholic high school or college education (I was unable to find much information about their elementary schools) also raises serious questions about the lack of adequate formation for most baptized Catholics. The consequences are clear: too many people claim to be Catholic but lack respect for the Eucharist and are unashamed of their support for abortion, same-sex marriage and other obvious moral evils. They should be ashamed — and so should we — for not doing everything possible to ensure a faithful Catholic education for every Catholic child.

We must do better. And if we do, the impact on society and the Church will be something wonderful to behold.

 

A version of this article by Patrick Reilly, president and founder of The Cardinal Newman Society, first appeared at the National Catholic Register.

Statement from the Cardinal Newman Society on amicus brief in Maxon v Fuller Theological Seminary

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The Cardinal Newman Society joined an amicus brief at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in the case Maxon v Fuller Theological Seminary, urging the court to protect the seminary’s right to set religious and moral standards for its students and members, regardless of the Biden administration’s interpretation of Title IX as applying to homosexuality and gender identity.

The plaintiffs, two students who were expelled for violating the seminary’s rules against same-sex unions, argue that the religious exemption in Title IX should not protect a nondenominational and independent religious institution.

“It is dangerous and un-American to deny a share in religious freedom for nondenominational and independent religious institutions,” said Patrick Reilly, president of The Cardinal Newman Society. “Such a policy would unconstitutionally discriminate against many of America’s religious schools and colleges, including those Catholic schools and colleges that are faithful to their beliefs but legally independent of the Catholic Church.”

The brief, which the Newman Society joined with the Christian Legal Society and other religious organizations, schools, and colleges, calls on the Ninth Circuit court to recognize that an independent institution controlled by a board of trustees with deeply held religious convictions and a religious mission is “controlled by a religious organization” for the purposes of the Title IX exemption.

The Cardinal Newman Society recognizes faithful Catholic schools and colleges and invited several to join the brief, including Belmont Abbey College (N.C.), Benedictine College (Kan.), Franciscan University of Steubenville (Ohio), Lumen Christi High School (Ind.), Marian High School (Ind.), the Regina Academies (Penn.), and Thomas More College of Liberal Arts (N.H.).

Other signers represent a variety of beliefs, including the American Association of Christian Schools, Association for Biblical Higher Education, Association of Christian Schools International, General Conference of Seventh-Day Adventists, Jewish Coalition for Religious Liberty, and Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod.

Read the brief here

Newman Society Statement on Supreme Court Decision in Fulton v. Philadelphia

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The Cardinal Newman Society is heartened by the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark religious freedom ruling today in Fulton v. City of Philadelphia, including the protection it provides for Catholic education. The Court’s ruling echoes the central theme of Hosanna-Tabor, that no religious organization forfeits its First Amendment rights by engaging in a public service. The Biden administration must immediately end its assault on religious freedom and allow the free and faithful practice of religion that our Founders envisioned.

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Why Critical Race Theory is Contrary to Catholic Education

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Catholic education offers a truthful and morally sound framework for considering issues of race, human dignity, and social justice. Yet cultural norms, historical developments, commonplace and novel assumptions, and associated passions all have some influence over Catholic education—sometimes for the good, but often distorting and even contradicting sound Catholic teaching. The human condition and social inequities and injustices can and should be addressed in Catholic education, with confidence in the Church’s wisdom and the ability of societies to respectfully unify around racial and cultural differences. In times of heightened concern and emotion, it is necessary that Catholic education inform and guide students’ understanding with great caution against divisive ideological and political influences.

Today emotional and heated discussions and protests focused on race seem to fill social media, endless news cycles, and opinion journalism. Concepts including “wokeness,” “intersectionality,” and “systemic racism” may be explicitly advocated or implicitly underlie conversation and classroom teaching. Terms such as “racist,” “hate,” “intolerance,” and “oppression” belong to the conversation, but they can at times be harmfully wielded as hasty moral judgments and powerful rhetorical weapons.

Continue reading at the Catholic World Report…