Archbishop Tutu and Gonzaga's Commencement Exercises

The controversy over Archbishop Tutu at Gonzaga has come up several times recently in conversation with friends and family, so I figured I'd post this here.

First off, of course, he's a tremendous figure on the world stage, and I am a relatively innocuous blogger, so there's a certain temerity in commenting in the first place.  But I think there's a reason for this controversy.



I think if abortion weren't, objectively speaking, the killing of the child in the womb of the mother, then for people to be pro-choice wouldn't be such a big deal. As it is, when you begin to get a handle on the sheer, fairy tale-like weirdness of this procedure and the depths of betrayal (father of the child to mother of the child, family of the mother to the mother, society to the mother, then mother and father to the child) involved in all these millions of lives lost, then the reaction to Archbishop Tutu makes sense.

If there were some award that could be given him very specifically for his work in South Africa, which could be targeted in such a way that he's not being held up in his entirety as a model for the student body, then I think that would work quite well. But commencement speakers tend to be brought to a place because they are considered to be eminent persons, having merited an honorary doctorate by the body of their life and labors, even if they have not done the academic work required for such a degree.

If his pro-choice views were merely expressed privately, if his antipathy towards the teaching of the Catholic Church on matters of sexuality, ordination, and sacrament were not witnessed to publicly, then again the situation might be different. But as it is, God bless the man for the good work he has done, and God bless the man with a conversion of heart on the problematic areas of his public witness.

Related links: 

What's Inside a Pregnant Woman?
A Pro-Life Atheist
Student Life VP Sue Weitz and Archbishop Tutu at Semester at Sea
GU Bulletin on the Controversy
The Inlander's take