Catholic Higher Education, Theology, and Academic Freedom.

Catholic Higher Education, Theology, and Academic Freedom, by Charles E. Curran (University of Notre Dame Press, 272 pp., (27-95)

EXACTLY a year ago Father Charles Curran lost the case he had brought against Catholic University of America in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia. In ruling against Curran, the presiding judge implicitly agreed with the university president's contention that there is "an ecclesiastical limit" on theological dissent at CUA and that the board of trustees had the right to suspend Father Curran from teaching theology there. Curran chose not to appeal because "success on appeal was far from certain." Instead he has made his case in Catholic Higher Education, Theology, and Academic Freedom.

The book has a measure of strength and appeal, not least because of Father Curran's tone; he is never vindictive toward his immediate adversaries and is touchingly grateful to the faculty, students, and attorneys who support him. To his credit, Father Curran provides in most cases an accurate, if not comprehensive, summary of the conservative Catholic views he disputes.

Readers who wonder if the Vatican and Catholic University have singled out Father Curran unfairly will find their answer in the deconstructionist subtext of his book. Whatever one makes of his ideas, it becomes clear that Curran has little respect for Church authority, and that he would like the Church in the United States to chart its own course, much as our revolutionary ancestors did in the political realm two hundred years ago.

Theologians, we are told, must "try to understand and appropriate the word and work of Jesus in light of ongoing historical and cultural realities." Those who demur, insisting instead that history should be enlightened by the Gospel, have not made "the shift from classicism to historical consciousness." That is to say, they inhabit the intellectual wilderness of pre-modern and pre-critical epistemology, actually believing "that not everything is subject to change" and that "Christ is the truth that never varies and that is not discovered by human inquiry."

To give recent history its due, we should note that Father Curran is neither the first nor the foremost of clerical deconstructionists. Predecessors such as Father Hesburgh, the former president of Notre Dame and one of the most influential academic figures of our time, prepared the way for Curran's laissez-faire concept of academic freedom. Without them, Curran could not reinforce his thesis by arguing that "growth in learning is the immediate goal of the Catholic university while concern for faith and morals is clearly a less direct goal."

And yet for all his invocations of modern progress, Father Curran's own growth in learning seems to have neglected much of what has been going on during the last two centuries-in the history of both the Church and the United States. He writes as if all great breakthroughs in Catholic education took place after 1960-about when he and fellow "reformers" entered the picture. "Catholic thought," Father Curran writes, "has generally been fearful of freedom and constantly cautioned against the dangers of too much freedom." Thus, "Catholic leadership could not really accept the American notion of religious freedom and the separation of church and state."

Not only does this remark do injustice to the institution which gave Father Curran his theological education and vocational standing; it belittles as "fear" a usually healthy institutional disposition-caution-not at all unique to the Church. One need only turn, for instance, to The Federalist Papers, as democratic in spirit as anything in our heritage, to find James Madison in Number 63 warning "that liberty may be endangered by the abuses of liberty as well as by the abuses of power; that there are numerous instances of the former as well as the latter; and that the former, rather than the latter, is apparently most to be apprehended by the United States."

The Founders-lost as they were in that pre-modern "wilderness," and lacking Father Curran's "historical consciousness"-seem to have shared the Church's fear of "too much freedom." In any case, such quotations do not support his thesis that the United States and the Catholic Church operate on fundamentally conflicting principles. The two must guard equally against abuses of trust.

For Father Curran, academic freedom is not a means toward truth but a good in itself; Catholic theologians must therefore have the same freedom as other scholars. Anticipating the reply that Catholic theologians will make mistakes just as everyone else does, he assures us, without much evidence, that mistakes can be corrected. To the objection that a theologian's mistakes could have very damaging moral consequences, he responds authoritatively that there really is no danger. Responsible Catholic theologians, he assures us, will always inform their audience when they are deviating from orthodox teaching, and "the academy itself provides a context and milieu that promotes and somewhat safeguards the search for truth even in Catholic theology." But what, one wonders, is "somewhat" of a safeguard? How would Father Curran like to be somewhat safeguarded from drowning or assault?

In pressing his argument for full academic freedom and for a Church which understands the Gospel "in the light of the contemporary scene," Father Curran claims the Second Vatican Council as his authority. He reminds us (with a minimum of context) that "The council affirmed 'the legitimate autonomy of culture."' It is only fair to remind Father Curran of other council affirmations, namely that "Christian freedom is fortified by obedience" "Dogmatic Constitution of the Church") and that Theological subjects should be taught in the light of faith, under the guidance of the magisterium of the Church" ("Decree on the Training of Priests").

Father Curran's struggle is not that of a wronged man seeking justice, but the on-going struggle to define what Catholic means in the modern world. Regrettably, his redefinition of Catholic theology would include selective approval of abortion, premarital intercourse, and homosexuality. These are among the great causes which he serves, driven, we are told, by a sense of "creative fidelity . . . to the work and word of Jesus." About the author's creativity, this labor of self-justification will leave no one in doubt. If only he would channel more of that zeal into fidelity.