Catholic Fire

Bringing the joy of Advent and the promise of Christmas into the marketplace, more than 100 Thomas Aquinas College students descended on Ventura's Pacific Mall on December 7, 2013,for a choral "flash mob." After stealthily gathering around the mall's Christmas central lobby — by the Santa Claus photo center and a Nativity display — the students simultaneously burst into song. They began with "Joy to the World" and "Silent Night," and then concluded with "O Holy Night." The mall's surprised customers and employees seemed to delight in the performance, stopping whatever they were doing to take in the music, to sing along, and to cheer wildly afterward.

 We hear a lot today about fake Catholic colleges and we know how destructive they can be the spiritual well-being of our Catholic youth. The most recent examples that come to mind are the Notre Dame Scandal , Cabrini College honoring the pro-abortion Catholic Cokie Roberts this past February, and the Georgetown University Scandal . But why is this happening? Dr. Anne Hendershott explores this phenomenon in her recently released new book, Status Envy: the Politics of Higher Education . In it, she explains that Catholic higher education is distancing itself from Catholic teaching in order to keep up with its secular counterparts. Via CNA: Hendershott spoke to the Catholic Transcript, newspaper for the Archdiocese of Hartford,  about how her experiences as a 15-year faculty member at the University of San Diego helped her to write her latest book on Catholic higher education. In a description on the cover of her book explains that since Catholic universities are not ...

Washington, DC (19 August 2009) – Students at Catholic universities across the nation are banding together with students at Belmont Abbey College in a stand for religious liberty and conscience rights. Students from the University of Dallas, Franciscan University of Steubenville, De Sales University and Catholic University of America are fighting back as one private school in North Carolina is being forced to fund contraception and chemical abortion under the Obama administration’s Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The EEOC ignited the First Amendment firestorm when it ruled Belmont Abbey College must include coverage for contraception in its employee health insurance plan. Hormonal contraceptives often function as abortifacients. “People need to wake up!” said Michael Barnett, American Life League’s director of leadership development and its LiveCampus college outreach program. “Under Obama, the federal government is forcing a religious institution to commit an act that violat...

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has ruled that a small Catholic college must include coverage for artificial contraceptives in its employee health insurance plan, raising new concerns about the need for conscience protections and religious exemptions in America’s health care policies. T he Cardinal Newman Society (CNS) today sent a letter to EEOC acting chairman Stuart Ishimaru, noting that “it is ironic that the federal agency responsible for protecting against discrimination has so blatantly engaged in an inexcusable violation of religious liberty in its Belmont Abbey ruling.” CNS also is sending a letter to all Catholic bishops in the United States, informing them of the EEOC action against Belmont Abbey College and highlighting the dangerous precedent this ruling sets to force Catholic employers to included contraceptive coverage in employee health plans. “No Catholic college or other institution should be required by government to violate the Catholic Chu...

Concerned parents who are wondering what their hard-earned money is supporting at "Catholic" colleges and universities just might be interested in the latest information released by the Cardinal Newman Society. According to their findings, 1 0 Catholic colleges and universities that are promoting student internships with organizations whose missions or activities are directly opposed to the Church's moral teachings on fundamental issues related to abortion and marriage. “This discovery validates the concerns of so many thousands of faithful Catholic parents and students, that public scandals at Catholic colleges are just the tip of the iceberg ,” said Patrick J. Reilly, President of The Cardinal Newman Society. “Under what definition of ‘Catholic education’ do students receive academic credit to work for leading pro-abortion organizations?” Those included on the list: Boston College - Their website recommends “Non-Profit Internship Sources” including two pro-abortion ...

by Judie Brown Recently, I came across an announcement that truly troubled me, not only as a Catholic, but also as a grandmother whose grandchildren will one day be attending college. The news was that on November 11, at St. John's Seminary in Camarillo, California, legal scholar Douglas Kmiec, also a dissident Catholic, was scheduled to give the 13th annual Newman C. Eberhardt Lecture. Lest we have so quickly forgotten, Kmiec is a "Catholic" who argued for months prior to the election that a Catholic could in good conscience vote for Barack Obama. He did this much to the chagrin of faithful prelates like Archbishop Charles Chaput, persisted right up until Election Day and apparently continues the campaign even now. Kmiec wrote a small tome entitled Can a Catholic Support Him? Asking the Big Question about Barack Obama. The book is simply an extension of his many articles on the subject, in which he repeatedly states, as though he were an authority of sound mind, Catho...