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AAUP Urges Bishops to Respect Academic Standards
By Hans P. Johnson
At the 2000 AAUP annual meeting in June, delegates appealed to Catholic bishops to confer with faculty and administrators at Catholic institutions regarding implementation of Ex Corde Ecclesiae, the Vatican document that aims to strengthen the church's ties to affiliated colleges and universities.
The Vatican announced its approval of norms for implementing Ex Corde on June 7, just before the annual meeting began. In response, delegates to the meeting passed the following resolution:
The American Association of University Professors' 1999 annual meeting commended the Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities, the Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities, the Catholic Theological Society of America, the College Theology Society, and the Catholic Biblical Association for their efforts to produce alternative proposals for the implementation of the Apostolic constitution, Ex Corde Ecclesiae, in the United States.
The Association's Committee A on Academic Freedom and Tenure, at its November 7, 1999, meeting, expressed "its deep concern and substantial reservations" about the draft implementation document for Ex Corde Ecclesiae then shortly to be considered by the National Conference of Catholic Bishops. The committee urged the bishops to defer a final decision. The Conference of Bishops approved the proposed implementation document on November 17, 1999, and submitted it to the Vatican Congregation for Catholic Education for approval. The Vatican's approval, which was given in May, was made public on June 7, 2000. The implementation norms take effect in one year.
In light of the above, the Eighty-sixth Annual Meeting of the American Association of University Professors urges the American Catholic bishops and other appropriate church authorities to engage in substantive discussions directly with the faculty and administrations of the Catholic colleges and universities in their dioceses concerning the implementation of Ex Corde Ecclesiae and its implications for academic freedom and institutional autonomy. This annual meeting further calls upon the academic community to scrutinize the actions taken to implement Ex Corde Ecclesiae to make certain that they are consistent with the basic principles upon which higher education in this country rests.
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