Why are so many American colleges and universities in crisis? Drew Gilpin Faust, an accomplished Civil War historian, gave the answer, perhaps unwittingly, at her 2007 inauguration as the twenty-eighth president of Harvard University.
Noting the Latin inscription Veritas [Truth] on Harvard’s shield, President Faust said that, at the university’s founding, that motto was “intended to invoke the absolutes of divine revelation, the unassailable verities” that shaped the mind of John Harvard, the Puritan minister and scholar whose benefaction made the school possible. In 2007, though, Veritas was understood “quite differently” on the banks of the Charles River. Truth, Faust continued, is not a “possession,” and those “unassailable verities” were no longer blowing through Harvard Yard with the autumnal leaves.
Rather than proceeding from a solid foundation of certain truths, intellectual life in the 21st century, President Faust suggested, was a matter of aspiration rather than conviction. Thus, the moral imperative of the life of the mind, as Dr. Faust understood it, was “to commit ourselves to the uncomfortable position of doubt.” For only in that “uncomfortable position” would students and faculty be able to live in “the humility of always believing there is more to know, more to teach, more to understand.”
This posture of radical skepticism—a principled refusal to say that there are certain things we can know to be true, period, not just true-for-me—strikes most people as ludicrous, if not downright absurd.
We know that Michelangelo’s Pietà is beautiful, and that its beauty is beauty-in-itself, not just beauty-for-me. Ditto for Bach’s St. Matthew Passion, Beethoven’s Emperor concerto, Mozart’s Ave Verum — and a well-thrown slider that dives away from the batter at the last instant. We know that, on its centenary, The Great Gatsby unveils perennial truths about the human condition. Or to reverse direction and traverse the via negativa, we know that rape and the torture of children are always and everywhere wrong — just as we know that anyone who denies that is a moral cretin. The human capacity to grasp the truth of things is not confined to a priori judgments, like 2 plus 2 always equals 4 in the base-ten system. Our intellectual reach is greater than that, and so is our intellectual grasp.
Ideas, as always, have consequences. The radical skepticism about the human capacity to know anything with certainty—a skepticism commended by Drew Faust in 2007 as stoic heroism — underwrites both nihilism (there is no inherent meaning in life) and relativism (there are no moral absolutes). And that lethal cocktail of skepticism mixed with nihilism and stirred into relativism has contributed mightily to the cultural and intellectual conditions on campus that have become painfully obvious over the past year and a half: conditions in which Claudine Gay (Drew Faust’s second successor as president of Harvard) waffled on the question of whether antisemitic, genocidal ravings in Harvard Yard were protected by “academic freedom,” because it all “depends on the context.”
Dr. Faust’s commitment to know more, teach more, and understand more is a noble and worthy one. A similar commitment made possible the invention of what we know as the “university” in the 13th century. And who invented the university? The Catholic Church, which believed in “the absolutes of divine revelation.” That belief, contra Drew Faust, was entirely compatible with robust debate. And such debates helped create the uniquely self-critical culture we know as Western civilization and the explosion of knowledge that Western civilization made possible—not least in the sciences.
That is why in my new book, Pomp, Circumstance, and Unsolicited Advice: Commencement Addresses and University Lectures (Ignatius Press), I suggest that Catholic institutions of higher learning can lead the reform of college and university life: if they refuse to indulge the fashionable skepticism that has led to the corruption of so many campuses, with devastating results now displayed on the front page of newspapers and the home page of websites.
Pomp is not a polemic. It’s a celebration of higher education as it ought to be, and indeed as it is at the schools that kindly invited me to deliver their commencement addresses — which I hope challenged graduates to live in the liberating truth of which the Lord spoke in John 8:32. The “university lectures” explore Catholic lives of great intellectual and cultural consequence, including John Paul II, Benedict XVI, Jean-Marie Lustiger, John Henry Newman, and Michael Novak.
I hope the book makes a good graduation present. I also hope it provides intellectual ammunition to the true reformers at Harvard, Columbia, Princeton, and other current collegiate battlegrounds.
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A timely book indeed.
Let’s remember that it takes practically no effort to try render asunder Truth.
It takes practically no moral life to try to render asunder Truth.
It takes no degree of intellectual incisiveness to try to render asunder Truth.
It takes no amount of personal courage or virtue to try to render asunder Truth.
But, always and at all times, Truth is everlasting; Truth is durable and resilient; Truth will richly reward those who go to its defence. Why? Because we were hard-wired by the Creator to know the Truth.
All the great American universities were founded by devout Christians and Christ was at the center: Harvard, Yale, Northwestern (its seal still has quotes from the New Testament; they may soon be gone too)…. Gradually—as usual the take-over of institutions by the anti-Christian left is done gradually, using the method that the frog in the boiling water experiment shows—the anti-Christian left took them over. See these articles:
“Harvard and Yale Drifted from Original Mission”
https://www.preachingtoday.com/illustrations/2014/march/2032414.html
“Harvard No Longer Truth for Christ and the Church”
https://answersingenesis.org/blogs/georgia-purdom/2011/10/11/harvard-no-longer-truth-for-christ-and-the-church/
The tuition at Harvard is too high…You have to sell the truth to get in. Proverbs 23:23 (ESV)
23 Buy truth, and do not sell it; buy wisdom, instruction, and understanding.
Tuition almost everywhere is too high. I kind of wish Mr. Weigel had spoken more about that part.
Florida has a great state college scholarship based on grade average. My oldest grandson’s getting a free ride & his sister has 75% off her tuition.
Orthodox Catholic colleges can be great but so can the debt be that’s incurred.
Can the poor be included as participants in Catholic Education? If we find that we cannot afford to keep our schools and colleges open to the poor, the Church should be ready to use its resources for something else which can be kept open to the poor. We cannot allow our Church to become a church primarily for the middle-class and rich while throwing a bone to the poor. The priority should be given to the poor even if we have to let the middle-class and rich fend for themselves.
Practically speaking, the Catholic Schools must give up general education in those countries where the State is providing it. The resources of the Church could then be focused on “Confraternity of Christian Doctrine” and other programs which can be kept open to the poor. These resources could then be used to help society become more human in solidarity with the poor. Remember, the Church managed without Catholic Schools for centuries. It can get along without them today. The essential factor from the Christian point of view is to cultivate enough Faith to act in the Gospel Tradition, namely, THE POOR GET PRIORITY. The rich and “A preferential option for the poor” should be maintained in our Catholic Schools. If we middle-class are welcome too. But the poor come first.
I agree, and JMO but considering the low number of babies being born in the U.S., and the number of people who are choosing to remain childless, I think many universities and colleges may likely find that someday, they won’t have enough new applicants to make it worth keeping all of their profs and other employees or funding any new research. The only hope is that our immigrants will continue to have babies and that they will have enough money saved to send their children to university or college–but many young people are opting for in-demand trades (e.g., welding) rather than a college degree.
Yes, Mrs. Sharon. We already have many foreign students paying full tuition & that helps keep colleges & universities afloat. Minus that, I think our higher education institutes will be facing some downsizing in the future.
I have a family member who works for a university & they said the school’s “DEI” bragging rights comes not so much from local young people but more from the numbers of affluent foreign students of colour whose families can afford to pay full tuition.
George asks: Why are so many American colleges and universities in crisis?
Simply Google Harvard’s ORIGINAL motto, then compare it to the current one. What’s missing is obvious! QED
Bingo
Outside of the Western tradition where the university began in the 13th Century, the so-called “modern world” is confronted by a pre-modern Islamic resurgence which claims that the truly first university was Al-Azhar in Cairo, Egypt, founded in A.D. 975 (or, is it 353 Islamic time, or again, something now only digital in the secularist “before current era” [BCE] chronology?).
Islam which—like decadent “process theology” in the West—displaces the philosophical (!) and non-demonstrable first principle of non-contradiction with the fluid non-principle of “abrogation.” And, whose theology also does not include the universality of original sin and, therefore, the built-in requirement for real humility (instead of the fideism and hubris of inflicting “Allah who alone is great”).
Two civilizations of roughly two billion persons each, and the deeper meanings of cross-boundary mixing, both sharing only one shrinking planet—as it spins elliptically and skeptically meaningless around the sun? In a universe no longer even a “universe,” but rather Richard Dawkins’ accidental non-universe…
So, what of the flatland of religious “pluralism,” or maybe Original Sin?
Does the interior mystery of fallenness bring us to the meaning of an Augustinian pope” And, to the difference between von Balthasar’s “theology on its knees” as compared to the hubris of, say, the lingering Teilhard de Chardin? Who couldn’t quite decide the personal significance, today, of the complete Incarnation of the Triune One at a concrete place and time within universal human history?
It’s almost as if there’s an irreducible difference between a town hall/egalitarian consensus (deformed “synodality,” or “ijma” and “Ijtihad” within Shi’ite Islam) and the foundational continuity of the Apostolic Succession and the distinct role of sacramental Holy Orders and the “hierarchical communion” (Lumen Gentium). Moreover, about the multiversity (no longer university) of higher education, it’s almost as if Pope St. John Paul II was onto something when he penned the poorly received Ex Corde Ecclesia—addressing the meaning of scientific and technical research, social life and culture.
And, whose Introduction reads, “On an even more profound level, what is at stake ‘is the very meaning of the human person’ [italics in the original].”
Long before Al Azhar etc. and even before the universities in Europe, there were public universities in the Christian Greek Roman Empire, the so-called Byzantine Empire. The book reviewed here points this out:
https://www.meforum.org/middle-east-quarterly/book-reviews/myth-of-the-andalusian-paradise
The “dating game!”
It depends on the definition of “university,” but the link you supply seems unrelated altogether. Thank you, however. The referenced book (2016) is a later expansion on an article supplied by in 2005 the same author and title in The Intercollegiate Review (Dario Fernandez-Morera, “The Myth of the Andalusian Paradise”, Intercollegiate Review, Fall 2006, pp. 23-31).
From the below links there does appear an earlier Islamic “university” (or only madrassa?) in Morocco. So thank you, I may stand corrected. Another and Byzantine candidate—again by some definition of “university”—showed up in 5th-century Constantinople. But, nothing early in Andalusia on the list.
https://collegestats.org/2009/12/top-10-oldest-universities-in-the-world-ancient-colleges/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Constantinople
Thank you for the links. In the book by Dario Fernandez-Morera, They Myth of the Andalusian Paradise reviewed by a professor of Medieval History at the Spanish university of Navarra in the link I provided, the author on pp 65-66 and on p 267 long erudite note examines the institutions of higher education in the Christian Greek Roman Empire (“Byzantine”; author also examines this misnomer, invented by a Protestant scholar in the sixteenth century and adopted ever since for a number of political reasons) as well as the role of Christian Greek scholars and scientists in much hyped Arabic learning.
George Weigel, the self-appointed guardian of Catholic orthodoxy, seems to believe that the Church’s mission is to preserve 1950s America in amber. His latest lamentation about the “crisis” in American higher education is less prophetic insight and more reactionary nostalgia dressed up as theology. His caricature of modern academia’s openness to intellectual humility as “nihilism” ignores the Catholic tradition’s deep respect for truth as a dynamic pursuit (cf. Gaudium et Spes 58). Catholic social teaching is, in fact, radically “woke” (which originated as a Black slang for “awake,” meaning alert to, aware of social injustices, and passionate in addressing them), that is committed to justice for the poor, the marginalized, and the oppressed (cf. Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church 160). Far from undermining truth, the Church calls us to seek it wherever it may be found (CCC 1716). Rather than weaponizing John 8:32 to pine for a rigid, imagined past, Weigel might do better to embrace the Church’s living tradition, one that is faithful, liberating, and deeply engaged with the realities of the world, not afraid of them. If Weigel truly seeks to reform higher education, perhaps he should start by embracing the Church’s own teachings on social justice and truth. Instead of clinging to a past that never was, he might consider how Catholic institutions can lead in addressing the pressing issues of our time, guided by a faith that is both faithful and responsive to the world as it is.
Language evolves. That’s just what it does . The origin of “woke” is one thing. Present day usage is another.
We did (moreso) used to be a church of the poor, served by the poor (like the nuns), that has changed to more wealthy people who don’t have many offspring.
We had a church pastor that sent a letter to their parishioners, starting out with, “Do you love Jesus?” – they were raising money to raise 7m for a new rectory. The widow who got this letter was on a fixed income.
I hope there were a great many priests intended to reside in that 7m rectory. Goodness! That’s a lot of money for a rectory. Our own priest serves 2 churches & our rectory is a modest brick house next to one of them.
De-con Dom,
Better in amber than in rainbow colors.
Wow… just curious, have you actually read his book? I doubt you’ve accurately characterized his thinking on higher ed.
“reactionary nostalgia”
The 1960’s called for you. They want their Hippie invective back.
Harvard President Drew Faust’s “Those ‘unassailable verities’ were no longer blowing through Harvard Yard with the autumnal leaves” ironically suggests the passing of those truths with the dying Autumnal leaves.
Weigel’s description of her understanding of truth speaks to a will o the wisp that we must humbly reverence. An unattainable something or other. It’s the commonly held reduction that harkens back to Pilate’s query. Pilate addressed his question to Truth itself. With faith in Christ truth became attainable simply because we possessed a First Principle from which truths can be inferred. That premise was supported by Aquinas via Aristotle in the first principle of all knowledge from a natural cognitive perspective, sensible perception. Therefore the First Principle could be arrived at and understood by inferred principles of reason, not simply by an act of faith.
That irreducible nexus was shattered with the loss of faith in the First Principle of existence. And with that the knowledge of truth and first principles, certitude based on apprehension of subject and predicate in one act of knowledge was lost. So now we mortals are wizened by our ignorance. She, Ms Faust spoke well when she said truth is not a possession, admitting that she is no more than an imbecile with a doctoral degree.
We cannot recover ourselves and education to wit unless we recover our lost faith in the God man Christ.
Additionally, the rationale for the collapse of inference from first principles was lost with the questioning of sensible perception, philosophically with Descartes’ methodical doubt, but also with a growing trend of questioning the very principles of right reason associated with the Protestant reformers. Descartes was likely influenced by the questioning of Catholic scholastic thought.
I avoid Wikipedia as a secondary source of knowledge because it is unscholarly and very biased, particularly vs Catholics. For general secondary knowledge I use the Encyclopedia Britannica onine at https://www.britannica.com/
And the incomparable Catholic Encyclopedia New Advent at
https://www.newadvent.org/cathen/