Xavier University To Cut 51 Jobs And 4 Million Dollars

Xavier University is laying off 31 employees and eliminating 20 additional, currently vacant positions in order to help balance its budget. University president Father Michael Graham announced the elimination of the 51 positions in a Tuesday email to the Xavier community. “Eliminating their positions to better secure our strategic future was a tough decision, one that I own,” Graham wrote. “I am sure that some will question whether we have compromised the Jesuit identity of Xavier University because the principle of cura personalis, the care of the person, is so very central to that tradition. I confess that I have pondered that myself. And yet, the Jesuit tradition has always sought to balance cura personalis with cura apostolica, the care and continuation of the work. It was in that balance that I made these difficult decisions.” Graham wrote in a May 30 letter that they layoffs would save $800,000 in fiscal year 2014 alone, which began July 1. The layoffs are part of $4 million in permanent cuts to the university’s budget, which will result in a balanced budget for the next year.

Link (here)

Reversing

In an interview with Cincinnati.com, Xavier University President Fr. Michael Graham, S.J., said that in light of the Supreme Court decision upholding Obamacare, 

he is reversing himself and the university will cover contraceptives for its 950 employees. And on top of that, 

he seemed to apologize for not being in the “center” on this issue.

Link (here) to

Marxist Priest Visits Jesuit Universities

In 1983, Ernesto Cardenal became an international cause celebre when Pope John Paul II publicly admonished him during a visit to Managua. The photograph of the moment is unsettling. There is Cardenal, even then snowy-bearded, kneeling before the pope on the tarmac of the Managua airport. But rather than bestow blessings, the pope wags his finger at Cardenal, a rare gesture of condemnation. 

Cardenal’s defiance prompted a Vatican ban on him administering the sacraments, which he has made no attempt to overturn.  Cardenal’s appearances in the United States to promote his latest work were greeted with hostility among some conservative Catholics. 

Thousands of protest letters spurred by the American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property, known by the acronym TFP, were sent to officials at Xavier University in Ohio and Loyola. “Inviting Fr. Cardenal to speak at a Catholic university is like welcoming a wolf into a hen house,” John Ritchie, TFP’s student action director, wrote in an e-mail. “It’s a scandal that Xavier University and Loyola University (Maryland) hosted this man. His radical Marxist views are not only flawed, but also detrimental to the faith and incompatible with the teaching of the Church.”

Link (here) to the full Washington Post article

Creepy Nicaraguan Communist Priest Has A New Book Of Creepy Poetry To Be Read At Xavier University

Diocesan Father Ernesto Cardenal, one of the greatest living poets from Latin America, is a priest from Nicaragua. He was an active member of the Sandinista movement. As minister of culture he was also one of three priests to hold a position in the Sandinista government. The Academic Service Learning Semesters and Voices of Solidarity will be hosting a bilingual poetry reading to introduce Fr. Cardenal's latest book: The Origin of Species and Other Poems. The event will take place in the afternoon on April 16th at Xavier University.

Link (here) to Ten Reasons to read the full post.

Hat Tip to Tancred (here) 

Watch a German Newscast of Pope John Paul II laying into Fr. Cardenal on the tarmac (here)

Some History of the Sandinista's in Nicaragua 

Nicaragua Executions Put at 500-1,000 [PDF]

Mass executions started within weeks of the Sandinista takeover.

Jose Esteban Gonzalez, Remember Nicaragua [PDF]

Nicaragua’s leading human rights activist on Sandinista persecution and terror.

New Regime, Old Methods
Inside Communist Nicaragua: The Miguel Bolanos Transcripts [PDF]

Defectors accuse the Sandinistas of atrocities in Nicaragua and aggression throughout Central America.

Inside the Sandinista Regime: A Special Investigator’s Perspective [PDF]
Defector Describes “Bloody,” “Corrupt” Regime [PDF]

A former high-ranking official explains how the Sandinistas murdered thousands.

Alfred G. Cuzan, Sandinista Goals Were Evident Long Ago [PDF]
Alfred G. Cuzan, The Nicaraguan Revolution: From Autocracy to Totalitarian Dictatorship? [PDF]
John Norton Moore, The Secret War in Central America and the Future of World Order [PDF, 5 MB]

Comprehensive record of the Sandinista role in provoking violence and war throughout the region.

J. Michael Waller, Will Sandinistas Face Justice?
J. Michael Waller, Tropical Chekists: The Sandinista Secret Police Legacy in Nicaragua

How the Sandinistas tried to build a police state through torture, rape, mutilation and murder. 

Link (here) to Paul Bagdonor

Amnesty International Apllies Moral Pressure To Jesuit University?

According to the Xavier Alliance, the organization was granted university recognition after 

pressure was applied by Amnesty International, an international hom@sexualist organization that has also embraced the pro-abortion position in recent years. 

The Xavier University in Cincinnati  initially resisted the creation of such a group in the 1990s, and still maintains a policy statement that “draws to the attention of all its members the traditional and wise Catholic moral teaching that properly locates sexual activity within the relationship of a man and a woman united for life through marriage as husband and wife.”  

Link (here) to the full, lengthy and detailed article.

Love Is In The Air For Valentines

Noticed the Cardinal Newman Society's post today about the distribution of "G@y? Fine by me" t-shirts by Gonzaga University and wondered whether our local Xavier University would be doing the same. Not only did XU not disappoint, but they go one better -- devoting an entire week to ... well, read it for yourself

Link (here) to the great Ohio based Catholic blog, Ten Reasons.

The Elected Leader Of The Republican Party Is A Catholic And Jesuit Educated

Speaker of the House John Boehner

Despite there being only 28 Jesuits colleges and universities in the country, nearly one in every ten members of the 112^th Congress has attended a Jesuit school for undergraduate or graduate studies. A total of 53 members—41 in the House and 12 in the Senate—have attended a Jesuit secondary education institution. In the House of Representatives leadership, the new Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH) and Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD) are both alumni of Jesuit universities, having attended Xavier and Georgetown, respectively.

Link (here) to Vox Populi of Georgetown University

Xavier University Jesuit Working In Prision

Easter’s promise of new life and hope held true for seven inmates at Lebanon Correctional Institution (LeCI) as they were received into the Catholic faith on April 4. Those initiated were Mark Gumm, Neal Harmon, Jeremy Lansing, Larry Stevens, Carl Geddes, Bruce McCune and Jeffrey Whalen.

Archbishop Dennis M. Schnurr presided at the joyous Easter Mass, held in the LeCI chapel and concelebrated by Jesuit Father Gene Carmichael. Approximately 120 people attended the liturgy, including members of various area parishes and about a dozen family members of the incarcerated men, none of whom had worshipped in the prison chapel before.

Link (here) to Rich Leonardi's blog entitled Ten Reasons, his entire post, Easter's Promise
Photo is of the Lebanon Correctional Instituation at night.

There Is A Jesuit In My Dorm Building

There are plenty of things to get used to for a college freshman.

But at Xavier University, there’s one more: adjusting to the fact that one of your new “dormies” is a Jesuit priest.

Since the 1940s, a priest has resided in each of XU’s five student residences, including Xavier president, the Rev. Michael J. Graham, S.J., who lives in Commons Apartments. The practice, which often delights parents and surprises students, grew out of the Jesuit tradition of cura personalis, a belief in caring for the whole person. For XU’s five resident priests, that can mean everything from providing Friday night pasta dinners to helping students develop a deeper prayer life.

It also means sharing early morning fire drills, movie nights and the stuff of their daily lives.“The students know they can turn to them for anything,” says Lisa Brown, associate director of residence life.

Priests live among students at 24 of the nation’s 28 Jesuit colleges and universities, according to the Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities. At some, the practice has been in place for more than 100 years.

Link (here) to the full story.

Something Is Cookin In The Kitchen!

From the flyer promoting "Liturgical Ministry Sign-up Sundays, Oct. 11 and 18" for Bellarmine Chapel at Cincinnati's Xavier University:

BREAD BAKER

Making the bread of life, a ministry of Christ’s presence! A simple recipe will be sent to you. A pizza pan works well for the baking. Best to experiment a few times before you’re “up” for a Sunday. Bread needs to arrive ten minutes before the Liturgy begins.

Link (here) to the Ten Reason's blog that originally reported on this.

Link (here) to Fr. Z's post on the same subject.

More on Catholic Communion bread (here)