THE DOMINICAN CHARISM IN CATHOLIC HIGHER EDUCATION:
Providence College on the Eve of its Second Century

J. Augustine Di Noia, O.P.
Undersecretary of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith
Inaugural Academic Convocation
1 October 2005

Keynote Address Outline
(Select a heading/topic below to jump to that section, or scroll down to read the address in its entirety.)

1. Introduction: religiously sponsored higher education in the U.S. 

• religiously sponsored higher education in the U.S.
• object of this presentation

2. Dominican identity and the Dominican charism

• Religious charisms
• The Dominican charism
• A spiritual but not invisible reality
• Culture and identity

3. The Dominican charism at Providence College

• Dominican culture and identity
• Complexity of Dominican identity
• Importance of decisions and policies for ensuring Catholic & Dominican identity

4. Ex Corde Ecclesiae (ECE) and Catholic identity in higher education

• Catholic higher education after Vatican Council II
• Contending with modernity
• Ex Corde Ecclesiae and the USCCB Application

5. The Catholic and Dominican future of Providence College

• Essential characteristics of Catholic identity
• Formation in Catholic/Dominican identity:  the future assured
• Distinctive Catholic vision: Trinitarian/ecclesial communion
• Faith and reason
• Authentic Christian humanism 

6. Conclusion

Bibliography

Introduction: religiously sponsored higher education in the U.S.
There are about four thousand institutions of higher learning in the United States.  A great number of these colleges and universities began their existence under the auspices of various Christian churches and communities. Yale and Harvard, Davidson and Emory, Wake Forest and Gettysburg, Brown, George Washington, and Vassar--these and countless other schools started out variously as Congregationalist, Presbyterian, Methodist, Baptist, Lutheran, or Evangelical institutions. But, as is well known, many of these schools "no longer have a serious, valued or functioning relationship with their religious sponsors of the past" (Burtchaell 1998, xi). 

When it was founded in 1917, Providence College was the hundred and third Catholic college to be founded in the United States since the establishment of the first--Georgetown University--in 1789. Today, in 2005, the College is just twelve years away from celebrating its hundredth anniversary, and has just inaugurated the president, its twelfth, who will, in all likelihood, usher it into its second century. 

To my mind--and I am sure to yours--it is unthinkable that Providence College would not continue into the foreseeable future as a Catholic and Dominican institution of higher learning. We want this future to be an assured one: how could something as wonderful and blessed as this College has been not go on like this forever?

I have been invited to reflect with you about the Catholic and Dominican future of the College.  I am well aware that in doing so I am joining a conversation that has been underway here for nearly twenty years. Just lately, your new president, Fr. Shanley, established an office for mission and ministry at the vice presidential level of the College's administration. My own brief remarks this morning are intended as a modest contribution to your own reflection on these critically important issues, particularly in two areas: the inseparability of the Dominican and Catholic elements in the College's historic identity, and the need for deliberate measures to ensure this Dominican and Catholic identity in the future.

In his indispensable book on religiously sponsored higher education in the U.S, The Dying of the Light, Father James Burtchaell demonstrated that the disengagement of many of previously religiously affiliated schools from their founding communities rarely resulted from policies deliberately chosen to achieve disaffiliation. On the contrary, this estrangement between colleges and churches was effected by men and women who appeared to want the opposite (Burtchaell 1998).  

The history of religiously sponsored higher education in the United States, as well as currently powerful secularizing trends in all sectors of our society, strongly suggest that the Catholic and Dominican future of Providence College will be assured only by deliberate and consistent policy decisions taken in the present by the faculty and the administration, the students and families, and the Board of Trustees, the diocese of Providence and the Dominican friars of the Province of St. Joseph. I shall argue here that among the concrete measures that need to be taken in the present should be this one: to strengthen the Dominican identity of the College as the key to securing and fostering its Catholic identity.

Dominican identity and the Dominican charism
According to a 1994 joint statement of the Congregation for Education and the Pontifical Councils for the Laity and for Culture: "Religious orders and congregations bring a specific presence to the universities. By the wealth and diversity of their charism--especially their educational charism--they contribute to the formation of Christian teachers and students" ("The Presence of the Church in the University and in University Culture," Part II, section 1). 

Many of the more than two hundred Catholic colleges and universities in the U.S. were founded by religious communities of men and women. In these schools, "the universal ideals of Catholic higher education were embodied in the diversity of distinctive cultures represented by the religious communities who sponsor" them (Bevilacqua 2000, 476). Thus, paraphrasing a remark made by Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua a few years ago at De Sales University, when we speak of the Catholic and Dominican identity of Providence College, we mean to say, not that being a Dominican college is something in addition to being a Catholic college, but that being a Dominican college is a way of being a Catholic college.

The Catholic identity of Providence College is uniquely configured in its Dominican identity. What this means is that the Dominican charism has given shape to the characteristically Catholic institutional and cultural reality of the College over its nearly ninety years of existence.

In the Catholic tradition, the term "charism" is generally used to refer to a gift of grace, bestowed by the Holy Spirit, that equips the recipient for a particular communal service. Applied to the founding charisms of particular religious communities like the Dominicans, Franciscans, and Jesuits, the term refers to a special gift of the Holy Spirit, given to the founders of these communities--St. Dominic, St. Francis, St. Ignatius, and others. This charism they then sought to embody in the distinctive forms of Christian life that they established in order to lead others to a fuller Christian life and to serve the Church in various ministries of evangelization, education, and the like. Religious institutes--as the various orders and congregations are called--are organized forms of consecrated life, recognized and approved by the Church, in which the fullness of the following of Christ can be found and pursued. Hence, the importance of fidelity to the founding charism and subsequent religious heritage of the religious community. In the words of Pope John Paul II:  "It is precisely in this fidelity to the inspiration of the founders and foundresses…that the essential elements of the consecrated life can be more readily discerned and more fervently put into practice" (Vita Consecrata § 36).

The Dominican charism captures all the essential elements of the Christian life, but configured according to the characteristic grace, vision, genius and example of St. Dominic (Bedouelle 1987). Ecclesiastical approval of the Constitutions of the Order is not simply a canonical formality, but a certification that the form of life to which the Dominican charism has given rise encompasses the way of the Gospel in its entirety. A form of life found in its institutional and communal embodiments, it is also a tradition of practical wisdom to whose tutelage one commends one's life and destiny. One's personal identity, one's own life, one's ways of thinking and acting, come to be shaped by the distinctive form of life to which the Dominican charism has given rise.

This is the reason why formation in a community is so crucial to becoming a Dominican, and why membership in a community--whether in a priory, a convent, or a Third Order chapter--is normally considered to be indispensable to persevering as a Dominican.  In the setting of particular communal relationships and commitments, the individual friar, nun, sister or lay Dominican undertakes the essential practices by which his or her Dominican identity is cultivated: pondering the word of God in the Scriptures, daily celebration of the Eucharist and the Liturgy of the Hours, attunement to the Paschal Mystery as it unfolds in the liturgical year, study, silence, recollection and meditation, and so on--all for the sake of preaching and the salvation of souls. There is a necessarily outward or apostolic thrust in the Dominican charism. No wonder that Dominicans have cheerfully embraced the mottos contemplata et aliis tradere ("to share with others the fruits of contemplation") and laudare, benedicere, praedicare ("to praise, to bless, to preach") as handy descriptions of what they're about.

The distinctive charism of a religious community is a spiritual reality, but it is not an invisible reality. The Dominican charism, like other religious charisms, is embodied in the life and teachings of its founder, in its rule and constitutions, in its characteristic embrace of the evangelical counsels of poverty, chastity and obedience, in its institutions and apostolates, in its characteristic garb and observances, and, perhaps above all, in the exemplary lives of its saintly members. Alongside the Benedictine, Carmelite, Jesuit and certain other great Catholic religious traditions, the Dominican charism has given rise to its own distinctive spirituality characterized notably (though not solely) by love of study and contemplation, a passion to know the truth and share it with others, an abiding dedication to the preaching of the divine mercy, a profound Eucharistic piety, and finally deep devotion to the passion of Christ and to the Blessed Virgin Mary (Hinnebusch 1965; Emery and Wawrykow 1998).

But it's a lot easier to recognize the Dominican charism than it is to define it. As a student brother in Dover, Massachusetts years ago, I can remember endless conversations--after celebrating the feast of St. Francis with the Franciscans at their friary in Rye, New Hampshire, for example--about what makes Dominicans different from Franciscans.  As we discovered in those conversations, and as many of you have undoubtedly discovered as well: it's something easier to recognize than to define.  The religious charism is not an abstract essence: rather, it is a particular spiritual gift which both shapes and is shaped by its recipient, and at the same time gives rise to particular institutional and social forms as others are drawn to embrace it and be transformed by it over the course of time (Ashley 1990).

In recent years the concepts of culture and identity have been applied to understanding the characteristic institutional, communal, and social forms in which religious charisms have come to be embodied (cf. Mannion 1993; Nichols 1997).  Within this framework, the ways of life of particular religious orders and communities are seen as distinctive cultures--Benedictine monasticism, Dominican life, and so on--that shape the personal identities of their members and influence the ambient cultures.

This is not the place to enter into a discussion of the fascinating theoretical issues entailed in the use of the concepts of culture and identity in this context (cf. articles in IESBS). It is interesting to note that the concept of identity first came to prominence in the 1950s in the work of Erik H. Erikson and his followers concerning personal identity and the challenges of what he called the "identity crisis" in psychosocial development.   Especially since the last quarter of the twentieth century, the concept has been widely utilized in the social sciences to study a variety of social and collective identities (Snow 2001). 

Loosened somewhat from its conceptual home in the social sciences, the notion of identity has entered popular usage as a way for social groups of all types to specify the ensemble of features that together constitute what they consider to be the distinctive character of their group.  It is in this more generalized sense that the concept of identity has entered the world of Catholic discourse, especially to aid reflection on the range of challenges to maintaining the specifically Catholic character of health care organizations, educational institutions and social welfare services operating under Church auspices.   Recent talk about "identity" in these contexts has almost always implied a "crisis of identity" (remember Erikson?), arising from either internal factors (e.g., self-doubt, declining membership in the sponsoring religious communities) or external factors (e.g., governmental regulation, secularizing ideologies), or from some combination of these.  Nonetheless, for our purposes and independently of any perceived "identity crisis", the concept is useful to highlight the embodied and socially transforming character of the Dominican charism and its central role as the bearer of the Catholic identity of Providence College.

The Dominican charism at Providence College
Along with their apostolic zeal and professional competence, the nine friars who started teaching at Providence College in 1919 brought their Dominican charism and its distinctive form of Catholic culture with them. Over the next eighty years, this Dominican Catholic culture molded the College in countless ways and contributed to making it the splendid place it is today.  

It is significant that the friars were almost immediately joined by lay collaborators in the College's educational apostolate. In speaking about the impact of the distinctive religious charisms of the founding communities of many of the Catholic colleges and universities in the country, Cardinal Bevilacqua made these telling comments: "The inherent attractiveness of their religious charisms, combined with their competence, dedication and zeal, quickly drew to them lay collaborators who either joined them as teachers and co-workers in these apostolic endeavors, or contributed material support for the institutions of higher learning which they established." Thus, the charisms of these religious families embraced teachers and other co-workers, students and their parents, friends and benefactors, and the local churches and surrounding communities, drawing them "into a deeper experience of their faith through the medium of the distinctive, yet fully Catholic, religious cultures of these institutions of higher learning" (Bevilacqua 2000, 476).  This happened in many Catholic colleges and universities sponsored by religious communities throughout United States, and it certainly has happened here at Providence College. 

Where is the Dominican Catholic identity of the College located? What elements are essential to maintaining and fostering it? These are not easy questions to answer. The Catholic and Dominican identity of the College is embedded in an interlocking web of structures, policies, curricula, understandings, historical memory, shared narratives, relationships, virtues, comportment, ways of praying and ways of dressing. Its transforming influence spreads out into the diocese and the local community here in Rhode Island, and, to some extent, even to the wider national community. Yet it remains here in the very stones of the place. The Catholic and Dominican identity of the College is at once readily recognizable and stubbornly indefinable, palpable and seemingly  durable, and yet also fragile because tied to an ensemble of shifting structural factors and personal commitments.

When I first arrived here as a student in 1961 and then returned in 1970 for three blissful years on the theology faculty and campus ministry team, the question of the Catholic and Dominican identity of the College simply didn't arise. It was everywhere taken for granted--from the maintenance department to the president's office, and in the wide world beyond.  But, for a variety of reasons (many of them common to other U.S. Catholic colleges and universities founded by religious communities), the Catholic and Dominican identity of Providence College can no longer be taken for granted--not because this identity is directly threatened but because the decision to maintain and develop it depends more critically than in the past on deliberately embraced policies and commitments. It has only been in the aftermath the Second Vatican Council, and especially in the lively discussion provoked by  Ex Corde Ecclesiae,  that we have come to see this so clearly.

Ex Corde Ecclesiae and Catholic identity in higher education
The Council had reaffirmed the traditional Catholic view of the possibility and character of Church sponsorship of colleges and universities (in Gravissimum Educationis). Following upon and implementing the conciliar teaching were two companion documents: Sapientia Christiana in 1979, concerning the governance of ecclesiastically accredited institutions, and, in 1990, Ex Corde Ecclesiae, concerning all other Catholic institutions of higher learning. In one sense, these documents were little more than a bit of canonical housekeeping. But because they articulate the different ways for ecclesial communion to be embodied by Catholic institutions of diverse types, they proved to be far more timely and far-reaching in their impact here in the U.S. than might have been expected. Our attention is focused here chiefly on Ex Corde Ecclesiae and in its application in the U.S. by our Episcopal Conference. 

In the final decades of the twentieth century, it had become clear that, given the political and cultural pressures favoring increasing secularization over the past hundred years and into the foreseeable future, the Catholic identity of currently Catholic institutions of higher learning would not be likely to be sustainable without concrete bonds between these institutions and the Church. Although we cannot rehearse their results here, recent studies have made it possible to identify with greater precision the cultural and political forces operative in the relatively swift transformation that has already occurred in Catholic higher education in the U.S. since the 1960s (Gleason 1995). 

Naturally, in developing its teaching and legislation in this area, the Church did not have only the situation in the United States in view. But the practical implications of an ecclesiology of communion, formulated with the whole Catholic Church in view, nonetheless had particular urgency in a situation where the disengagement of colleges and universities from their Christian churches had become endemic.

We have before us the record of the failure of countless  informal arrangements by which sincere and well--meaning faculty, administrators and church leaders of once church--related colleges and universities believed that they would be able to ensure the Lutheran, Presbyterian, Methodist, Congregationalist, and other denominational identities of their institutions (Burtchaell 1998; Mardsen 1994).  Without the adoption of concrete provisions, and relying solely on the good will and sense of commitment of Catholic educators and bishops, few of the currently Catholic institutions of higher learning in the U.S. are likely to remain distinctively and recognizably Catholic. Even with the adoption of something like clearly stated juridical provisions of the USCCB Application, it may be that the secularizing trends will turn out to have been irreversible in some of the two hundred or more Catholic institutions of higher learning in the U.S.

Simply expressed, the fundamental concern of Ex Corde Ecclesiae was to ensure the present and future Catholic identity of the colleges and universities founded and sponsored by the Catholic Church throughout the world.  In the U.S., in the discussions both of its early drafts in the 1980s and then of the formulation of the national norms for its application here,  Ex Corde Ecclesiae came as a wake-up call for Catholic higher education (Di Noia 1999).

The Catholic and Dominican future of Providence College 
Central to both Ex Corde Ecclesiae and its Application for the U.S. is the requirement that Catholic colleges and universities internalize the renewed ecclesiology of communion in the structures of their institutions.

Catholic identity will not be sustainable over the long haul without clearly expressed communal bonds with the universal and local Church. Drawing upon Ex Corde Ecclesiae, the Application summarizes the four characteristics that are essential for Catholic identity and that need to be expressed in concrete provisions guiding the life of the university community: (1) Christian inspiration in individuals and the university community; (2) reflection and research on human knowledge in the light of Catholic faith; (3) fidelity to the Christian message in conformity with the Magisterium of the Church; (4) institutional commitment to the service of others. The Application proceeds to supply a series of norms to help to ensure the Catholic identity of colleges and universities operating under Church auspices in the U.S.

The Application invites us to consider the concrete measures that will secure the Catholic identity of the schools in our charge through the prism of these schools' founding religious charisms: "Catholic universities cherish their Catholic tradition and in many cases the special charisms of the religious communities that founded them. In the United States, they enjoyed the freedom to incorporate these religious values into their academic mission. The principles of Ex Corde Ecclesiae afford them an opportunity to re-examine their origin and renew their way of living out this precious heritage" (section VII).

This text supports the cumulative argument I have been advancing today:  in the present cultural and ecclesial context, the continual  recovery of the founding charism of the Dominican Order is crucial to maintaining the essential characteristics of the Catholic identity of Providence College. This argument depends in part on a theological understanding of the nature of religious charisms, especially in major traditions of consecrated life such as the Benedictines, the Dominicans and the Jesuits. It also draws upon on the application of the concepts of culture and identity to the communities and institutions which express and embody these religious charisms.  In addition, my argument has been influenced by a reading of the history of religiously sponsored higher education in the U.S. and by observing how Catholic health care and social service organizations have confronted a range of challenges to their Catholic identity in recent decades. All of this leads me to say, with some confidence, that the Catholic future of Providence College depends to a significant degree on its Dominican future.

If I am right about this, then the Catholic identity and mission of Providence College are not likely to prove sustainable in the long term apart from a community of persons dedicated to fostering the relationships that express ecclesial communion in its particular Dominican embodiment.

Throughout the history of the Catholic Church, the Catholic identity and mission of our educational, health care and social service institutions have depended on the commitment and dedication of communities formed in Christ and united in ecclesial communion by their particular religious charisms. Their educational, healing and charitable services arose out of the explicitly religious motivation of communities founded to advance a particular mission in these areas and to undertake these services as corporate apostolates of their institutes. The issue of the "Catholic identity" of the institutions dedicated to the provision of these services in the U.S. has in part arisen as the outcome of the decline in membership in the sponsoring religious communities of these institutions.  In response to this development, Catholic health care, for example, has made an effort to introduce "formation programs" for the members of their boards, for their administrators and staff, and even for the constituencies they serve so that these people can internalize a sound Catholic vision as well as the particular charisms of the founding communities (e.g., Sisters of Mercy or the Daughters of Charity).  These efforts are far-sighted and exemplary.

Both Ex Corde Ecclesiae and the U.S. Application envisage similar efforts on the part of Catholic higher education. The Application contains provisions to ensure a critical mass of Catholic professionals on the boards and faculties of our institutions of higher learning. Even more important are the establishment of programs for the Catholic formation of these dedicated persons.

It is not my place to say what sorts of measures Providence College will find appropriate to cultivate the kind of community upon whom its Dominican and Catholic future will continue crucially to depend. Allow me to suggest just a few elements of the vision that will have to be shared by these persons if the College is to enjoy a vital Catholic and Dominican future.

By profession and instinct, Dominicans grasp the importance of broadly shared convictions about the distinctive message of the Catholic Christian faith, especially at a moment when rival religious and quasi-religious alternatives compete for attention and allegiance. In short, Dominicans understand that it cannot be taken for granted that people know what it means for a person or a college to be Catholic. The distinctive Catholic vision of human existence and of the academic life needs to be articulated, discussed, and shared by the College community, even while non-Catholic faculty, staff and students are welcomed and treasured.

Furthermore, both Ex Corde Ecclesiae and the USCCB application document frame the distinctive character of the Catholic faith in terms of an ecclesiology of communion that is itself a distinctive element in Dominican theology and spirituality. What Christ taught us and what we proclaim to the world is that the triune God invites all human persons to participate in the communion of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and with one another in them. God desires this and, as I sometimes say, no one has ever desired anything more, and nothing makes sense apart from it.  Holiness is the transformed capacity to enjoy this communion, and ecclesial communion is at root nothing less than trinitarian communion. This basic truth of Catholic faith unfolds in an ensemble of other truths about creation, incarnation, redemption and sanctification. The central truths of the Christian faith find their deepest meaning in the reality of trinitarian communion. Everything created exists so that the Blessed Trinity could realize this plan of love. Through the incarnation and the paschal mystery, Christ enables creaturely persons to enter into the life of the uncreated Persons. In the Church, the Holy Spirit unites all those transformed in Christ and draws them into the communion of trinitarian love. Ecclesial communion is nothing less than the beginning of our participation in the life of the Blessed Trinity.

A reflective, unapologetic and forthright articulation of this distinctive vision of human existence and academic life has always been central to the Dominican culture of Providence College. 

What is more, in the Catholic tradition, particularly as it has been shaped over the centuries by Dominican thinkers, it is understood that to view one's life and one's vocation in the light of this invitation to trinitarian communion does not constrain human reason and freedom but opens them out to their widest conceivable fulfillments.  It has been an especially important contribution of Dominicans like Albert the Great and Thomas Aquinas to show that intellectual inquiries pursued within the framework of this vision nonetheless possess an integrity and finality of their own (MacIntyre 1990). To say that the triune God is the ultimate end of human thinking and striving is not to exclude other interests and ends, but to order them to the all-encompassing end of interpersonally shared communion.  Applied to intellectual life, this insight in many ways constituted the charter for Catholic higher education and the authentic freedom of those who pursue it.

In addition, Providence College has been and should continue to be a place where students can imbibe an authentic Christian humanism which affirms the intrinsic link between what human beings are and what they can hope to become. Created in the image of God, human beings are meant to grow into the image of Christ. As they become increasingly conformed to the perfect man, Jesus Christ, the fullness of their humanity is realized. There "a finality built into human nature as such, and, although its realization is possible only with the assistance of divine grace, this realization is in a real sense continuous with the tendencies and aspirations of human nature" (Di Noia 2004, 270).  Deeply characteristic of the vision central to Dominican identity is a wholly refreshing optimism about this possibility.

Dominicans understand that, apart from the sanctification of desire, the possibility of such a realization will be sharply curtailed.  The cultural circumstances created by the late twentieth century sexual revolution are uncannily similar to the thirteenth century situation in which the Dominican Order emerged. Like thirteenth century Albigensianism, the ideology of the sexual revolution-with its fateful separation of sexuality and procreation-drives a wedge between the realms of spirit and matter, between mind and body. People have been led to believe that the human body can be instrumentalized for the satisfaction of any type of sexual desire as long as the mind retains it lofty--Albigensians would say "pure"--intentions.  Dominicans understand that this is an idea with lethal consequences for the body and for the soul. For one thing, pace post-modern Albigensianism, what you do with your body can hurt your soul-lofty intentions to the contrary notwithstanding. But far more seriously, from the perspective of an authentic Christian humanism, the divorce of physical and spiritual desire and fulfillment short-circuits the natural tendency of desire to seek the divine Good through the enjoyment of created goods like sexual pleasure in marriage. Without the sanctification of desire, through the virtues of chastity and temperance, there can be no true human fulfillment and certainly no attainment of wisdom.

I am painfully aware of how much more has to be said about the richness of the characteristically Dominican embodiment of Catholic faith and life, and its realization here at Providence College. Dominicans and their collaborators will surely want to help their students and associates not only how to think and study, but also how to love, how to pray, how to value--and indeed to adore--Christ present in the blessed Eucharist, how to integrate traditional Catholic devotion into their personal piety, how to cherish the holiness of their bodies, how to take responsibility for the poor, the underprivileged and vulnerable members of society, how to live for God above all else.

Throughout its history, the College has demonstrated an astonishing ability to attract board members, faculty and staff, benefactors and friends, who are deeply convinced of and profoundly committed to the Dominican and Catholic identity of the College. Undoubtedly, the new vice president for mission and ministry, as well as the newly established institute for Dominican studies, will have central roles to play in the formation of a community of persons fully committed to the Catholic and Dominican identity of Providence College--a complex cultural and social reality which perhaps more than anything else depends on the dedication and commitment of people who have been formed and transformed by it.  

*   *   *   *   *

The history of religiously sponsored higher education in the United States demonstrates that, if the Catholic and Dominican future of the College is to be an assured one, it will only be because of decisions and policies embraced in the present. In Ex Corde Ecclesiae and the Application for the U.S., the Church has provided some effective tools for thinking about what these decisions and policies should be.  Everyone who holds the future of Providence College in their hands should ponder how deeply entwined is the Dominican and Catholic identity of this remarkable institution which finds itself today with a new young president contemplating the second glorious century of its existence.

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*   *   *   *   *  

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