In the rush of election coverage, other important Register coverage hasn’t gotten the play it should have.

The Cardinal Newman Society’s Center for Higher Education produced a study with QEV Analytics that surveyed current students and recent alums of Catholic higher education. This news broke on the Register’s website ... on Tuesday, Nov. 4.

Read the story (linked from the home page or by clicking here) but the findings include:
60% say abortion should be legal.
60% say premarital sex is not a sin.
57% say same-sex “marriage” should be legal.
39% saw officials or staff encouraging contraceptive use.
31% saw officials or staff encouraging acceptance of homosexual activity.

How could this be? How is it that Catholic parents pay good money (and a lot of it) for a Catholic education at a Catholic school ... and get a thoroughly secularized son or daughter back from the process?

Pope Benedict XVI reiterated the call for stronger Catholic Identity at The Catholic University of America on April 17 this year, when he said:

“Teachers and administrators … have the duty and privilege to ensure that students receive instruction in Catholic doctrine and practice. This requires that public witness to the way of Christ, as found in the Gospel and upheld by the Church’s magisterium, shapes all aspects of an institution’s life, both inside and outside the classroom.”

He added:

“In virtue of [academic] freedom you are called to search for the truth wherever careful analysis of evidence leads you. Yet it is also the case that any appeal to the principle of academic freedom in order to justify positions that contradict the faith and the teaching of the Church would obstruct or even betray the university’s identity and mission.”

Our Catholic Identity Survey has found some schools that are in compliance with Church guidelines. (It’s always available under the “Resources” tab above.)

— Tom Hoopes