Dolphin Down

COLLEGE MEDIA ADVISERS, May 12 — The national organization of student newspaper advisers has sanctioned the Jesuits’ Le Moyne College in Syracuse, N.Y., for attempting to censor its student newspaper, The Dolphin, by abruptly replacing its faculty adviser.

The group said “Le Moyne fails to value the exercise of free speech and the value of a free press on the college campus.”

Le Moyne “released” professor Alan Fischler from his role as the newspaper’s faculty adviser after he wrote a column that voiced disapproval over the college’s dismissal of graduate education major Scott McConnell, who had written a paper that favored corporal punishment and objected to multiculturalism.

McConnell was reinstated after winning a lawsuit against LeMoyne.

Largest Class

ST. THOMAS AQUINAS COLLEGE, May 25 — Archbishop Celestino Migliore, apostolic nuncio and permanent observer of the Holy See to the United Nations, addressed the college’s largest graduating class in the college’s 35-year history.

Some 78 graduates received their diplomas from the prelate, who gave the commencement address and presided at the Santa Paula, Calif., college’s baccalaureate Mass.

Archbishop Migliore was awarded the St. Thomas Aquinas Medallion, the college’s highest honor.

Past recipients have included Cardinal Francis Arinze, Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, Cardinal Avery Dulles and Blessed Teresa of Calcutta.

 

Abstinence Wins

ASSOCIATED PRESS, May 25 — Wisconsin’s pro-abortion Gov. Jim Doyle, a Democrat who has frequently vetoed pro-life legislation, has signed a measure that requires public schools to spend more time teaching abstinence education than other methods of preventing pregnancy, AP reported.

“Young people need to hear that message,” Sen. Mary Lazich, a Republican, told the wire service.

She added, “Rather than teaching that condoms and birth control pills are acceptable modes of behavior, students will be taught they’re not safe, acceptable, or healthy and what is acceptable is abstinence.”

No Regrets

THE ADVERTISER, May 25 — Lafayette, La., Bishop Michael Jarrell walked off the stage during the Teurlings Catholic High School graduation in response to what he called an “intolerable situation,” reported the newspaper.

In a graduation ceremony presided over by the bishop, the presentation of diplomas was repeatedly interrupted by what the bishop described as “cheering, hoots and hollers” — despite repeated admonitions to hold all applause until after all the graduates had been announced.

“People who are appalled at the rude behavior sit there and take it because they have no choice,” the bishop wrote. “I was in a position in which I could do something, so I chose to do it.”

Home School Ban? 

THE HOME SCHOOL LEGAL DEFENSE ASSOCIATION, May 25 — The home schooling association is warning that sovereign nations, including the United States, face the threat that home schooling may be deemed illegal under international law.

The defense association said that American judges may effectively try to impose the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child, which has never been ratified by the U.S. Senate.

According to a new interpretation of “customary international law,” some U.S. judges have argued that even an un-ratified convention still has an “impact” on American law.