The scandal is now several weeks old, but the administration of the University of Notre Dame still refuses to rescind its invitation to Obama to be this year's commencement speaker. University President Fr. Jenkins defends his bewildering decision by saying that having the messianic claimant on campus will be an opportunity to "engage in dialogue" with him, but Obama is coming not to engage in dialogue but to present a monologue; that's what a commencement address is. And guess which point of view he's going to present in this monologue: that of God, or his own?
Of course, I don't actually know what Obama is going to say at Notre Dame; it would be nice to be able to believe that his address will have nothing to do with the critical moral issues on which the Roman Catholic Church has consistently taken the right, and Obama just as consistently the wrong, positions. Even if he were to avoid controversy, though, there would remain the shameful fact that this great Christian university is bestowing accolades upon the most un-Christian President in US history, both by the intention to present him with an honourary degree and by the mere fact of having selected him to be the speaker.
I can think of only one possible reason for Father Jenkins' otherwise inexplicable decision: perhaps he's under the impression that our chief executive spells his name "Burrach O'Bamagh," and is thus an Irishman.
