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Feb 22, 2022 10:49:27 GMT -5
Post by diehardexplorer on Feb 22, 2022 10:49:27 GMT -5
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smh
Feb 22, 2022 13:31:21 GMT -5
Post by gymrat67 on Feb 22, 2022 13:31:21 GMT -5
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Feb 22, 2022 13:35:05 GMT -5
Post by JoeFedorowicz on Feb 22, 2022 13:35:05 GMT -5
What is the point of these posts
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Post by brotherteliow on Feb 22, 2022 13:50:19 GMT -5
What is the point of these posts Wokification of our fine Roman Catholic institution.
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Feb 22, 2022 14:03:08 GMT -5
Post by gymrat67 on Feb 22, 2022 14:03:08 GMT -5
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Feb 22, 2022 14:38:51 GMT -5
Post by JoeFedorowicz on Feb 22, 2022 14:38:51 GMT -5
What is the point of these posts Wokification of our fine Roman Catholic institution. The lady has a doctorate in religious ethics and was writing about her own personal story. Did you read the article?
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Post by diehardexplorer on Feb 22, 2022 15:16:05 GMT -5
Wokification of our fine Roman Catholic institution. The lady has a doctorate in religious ethics and was writing about her own personal story. Did you read the article? i read it. i don't care that she has a doctorate. my personal story tells me that la salle university has nothing to apologize for in their treatment of poc.
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Feb 22, 2022 15:19:33 GMT -5
Post by JoeFedorowicz on Feb 22, 2022 15:19:33 GMT -5
The lady has a doctorate in religious ethics and was writing about her own personal story. Did you read the article? i read it. i don't care that she has a doctorate. my personal story tells me that la salle university has nothing to apologize for in their treatment of poc. Are you talking about this?
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Post by big5explorer on Feb 23, 2022 13:14:38 GMT -5
I saw the article yesterday, and was greatly disappointed, angry, and offended. There is so much wrong with it, that I don't know where to even begin.
But having been a lifelong member of the Catholic Church, and a member of the University (and the University's Catholic outreach while a student), I found the headline tagging American Catholics as anti-Black highly offensive. And for this to come from someone who teaches religion at the University was very disappointing.
And, how about using actual *facts* rather than family *anecdotes* to support that Catholics are anti-Black?
Some of the language also is super-woke and lends to perpetuating a victim narrative: "We’re trying to lean into the particularities of our mission, and our mission has long been to educate the folks who have been made poor." Exactly who have been "made poor?" And who is making them poor? The Catholics? Are they poor because Catholics haven't helped? Perhaps as a student my spending every Sunday night handing out free sandwiches to the poor in Center City wasn't enough.
When the University wonders why enrollment is down, especially from their traditional Catholic high schools, it may be due to the nonsense like this over the last 5-10 years. When the University wonders why donations are down from traditional donors, they can look to articles like this.
While this woman has every right to vocalize her opinions in a city newspaper, when she does it as a La Salle professor (with a photo of her sitting inside the chapel) she also represents the University. And if the University wants to come across as a self-loathing Catholic institution they will have only themselves to blame when they lose many of their traditional supporters.
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Post by GlitterBro #2 on Feb 23, 2022 13:39:54 GMT -5
"We’re trying to lean into the particularities of our mission, and our mission has long been to educate the folks who have been made poor." Exactly who have been "made poor?" And who is making them poor? The Catholics? Are they poor because Catholics haven't helped? When the University wonders why donations are down from traditional donors, they can look to articles like this. Donations are down because you, as a Catholic, are making La Salle poor.
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Feb 23, 2022 15:40:26 GMT -5
Post by JoeFedorowicz on Feb 23, 2022 15:40:26 GMT -5
I feel like I'm taking crazy pills. Can someone please pinpoint what she said that is so inflammatory?
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Post by big5explorer on Feb 23, 2022 18:40:29 GMT -5
I feel like I'm taking crazy pills. Can someone please pinpoint what she said that is so inflammatory? Well, since it is really an interview and not much about her book is referenced, I can only go by her quotes in the article: 1. "For more than 10 years, my focus has been on thinking about the Christian tradition and the Catholic tradition, in particular, in response to racial inequality and racial inequity in society but also in the church." I'll bone-pick with the editor, since I do editing myself. The word church should be capitalized, as she probably meant Church. But, since she is answering a reporter's question, how about giving some data as to why the Church is "anti-Black" or how it is a cause of "racial inequity." No examples....just an pretty harsh label. 2. "O’Connell, an associate professor of Christian ethics at La Salle since 2013, combed through Archdiocese of Philadelphia archives trying to understand what was happening in parishes when her ancestors lived in them." You know what was happening in parishes in Philly for 5 generations? Parishes were Irish or Polish or Italian or Black or Puerto Rican. They were parochial. Same goes for NY or Boston. That doesn't make them anti-Black. It makes them parochial. One could argue, with good examples, that Irish parishes were once anti-italian, or Italian parishes were anti-Irish. It doesn't make them all anti-Black for 5 generations. 3. The title of her book is: "Undoing the Knots: Five Generations of American Catholic Anti-Blackness." It implies that there is a tradition of Catholic anti-Blackness, going back generations. 4. Her anecdote: "We were having a discussion about the “all lives matter” rejoinder to the Black Lives Matter mantra and trying to have a very honest conversation ... and I’ll never forget a Black student just said, “You know, when it comes to racism, I just wish people would believe me ...” And I started to think why is there reluctance to believe that on the part of white people." Did the Black student provide examples of racism? How does she know for sure that there was reluctance on the part of White people to believe him? Did she talk to the White people, or is she simply assuming that they didn't believe him, without getting their perspective as well? What does this have to do with the Catholic Church or Universities? Also, as an editor, I find the decision to follow AP guidance to capitalize Black and not white as far-Woke and divisive. 5. "There is really a strong desire for self-preservation and institutional preservation over the well-being of the whole community, whether that was the need to preserve a neighborhood by making sure that people of color don’t move in because we need to preserve property values of our homes and we need to preserve the value of the physical infrastructure of the church and the school and the rectory, or we need to preserve our test scores at our institutions because we need to continue to be selective and competitive." There is a LOT to unpack here. If she wants to use preserving values of homes as an example, she might wish to provide examples of this being an irrational fear. But this might be difficult in Philly neighborhoods, like north Philly. Is Broad & Olney more safe now than it was in 1950? Are neighborhoods, like Summerton, along the Boulevard safer now than they were just 15 years ago? Perhaps the "strong desire" to preserve neighborhoods is grounded in wanting to feel safe, and has little to do with being anti-Black. Perhaps preserving the safety of a neighborhood actually has A LOT to do with "preserving the well being of the whole community." And, how does this dumb argument about neighborhood preservation apply to a church or a rectory? That seems like an incredible stretch of logic. And is she implying that the need for a University/Institution to preserve test scores is anti-Black. That itself seems racist on her part. Perhaps she is thinking that being competitive is anti-Black? Are Blacks not capable of achieving good grades? Seems like a stereotype. And, is her answer to lower the competitiveness of a University? Sounds that way. And should only Catholic Universities do this? 6 "My mother’s father was a developer in the post-World War II suburban housing boom ... The wealth my mother experienced as a child and the financial stability they had came from anti-Blackness in federal housing policies ... That stability for my mother gets plowed into her first house. [O’Connell’s parents] were just able to accrue wealth through homeownership and that wealth and equity was handed on to me." This is a bunch of rhetorical gobbledygook. So the primary reason generations of Americans acquired houses and built wealth was due to racist federal housing policies? This is ridiculous. 7. "You also say Catholic colleges have not done right by Black students? Too much of our Catholic core curriculum or our Catholic intellectual tradition is very Eurocentric. So I think that that is making it sort of hard for our students of color to see themselves in our curriculum. White students do not have places where [they] are being challenged or confronted by learning and cultures and stories that are different from that Eurocentric frame and that is not setting [them] up for success." Maybe I need to read the book to see what her specific examples are of curriculum Eurocentricity. Catholicism isn't inherently Eurocentric. There are more Catholics in South America than Europe. There are relatively few Catholics in England, or Germany or Scandinavia. Seems a stretch to assume that to be an American Catholic is to be Eurocentric. She may wish to define "of color." Also, when it comes to La Salle, since she is a member of the Religion Department, she is probably aware that quite a few students take courses in Buddism, or Islam, while at La Salle. For me, 25 years ago, the majority of my Religion courses were NOT specifically Catholic, and they certainly were not "Eurocentric." Also, my Philly-based parents and grandparents attended Mass done, not in English, but in Latin. 8. "We’re trying to lean into the particularities of our mission, and our mission has long been to educate the folks who have been made poor." Are the "folks who have been made poor" only Black? That seems like a racist assumption. And "made poor" is a very passive, victim-narrative phrase. 9. "What do you hope Philadelphia learns from your book? I hope that the message is one of candor, that in telling the truth we can be liberated from all the energy we spend trying to hide or dodge it." Is the "truth" only her truth? Maybe she would spend "less energy" hiding or dodging if she lived in North Philly instead of Chestnut Hill.
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smh
Feb 23, 2022 18:53:00 GMT -5
via mobile
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Post by explorer88 on Feb 23, 2022 18:53:00 GMT -5
I don’t want her teaching my kid.
La Salle is going woke. This path will lead to certain death. The school is killing itself all in front of our eyes.
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smh
Feb 23, 2022 19:04:08 GMT -5
Post by JoeFedorowicz on Feb 23, 2022 19:04:08 GMT -5
Thanks for that. I'm not going to quote it or go line by line, but you (or I, or anyone here) haven't read her book. I'm sure that she goes deeper than the article or it wouldn't be a very good book.
That said, your points just don't hit home for me. A lot of them would probably make more sense if you read the book. Not saying you'd agree, but saying "she doesn't give examples" is because she wrote a book and they just talked on the surface level about the book. But you then question the sincerity of a black college student who says she experiences racism.
I disagree.
And that's ok. We're allowed to disagree. But the premise of this entire thread is how La Salle is somehow in trouble because of wokeness cause one professor who has a doctorate in religious ethics and wrote a book that I'm sure she researched. And some people don't like the idea that the Catholic Church might have done something wrong. Or that white people have. I don't know.
I'm not going to go further. Thanks again for writing that up. I just don't have the same rigid thought pattern regarding this. I'm not the best Catholic anymore either but that has nothing to do with race.
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Post by big5explorer on Feb 23, 2022 19:20:16 GMT -5
I disagree. And that's ok. We're allowed to disagree. . Of course we're allowed to disagree. Though I wonder why you disagree. Are you aware of good evidence that the *primary* reason many of our Catholic parents and grandparents were homeowners was due to racist federal housing policy? Or could it be that they actually worked their tails off in factories and such to provide a better life for their family and children? What infuriates me most about her interview is her implied criticism of Catholics and Catholic Universities like La Salle. Most of us - or maybe all of us - chose to attend a Catholic University located in a mostly Black neighborhood. Many of us, while attending the school, volunteered time to help improve the neighborhood and city around us. Arguably, the University and its students do more to help the neighborhood than the neighborhood does to help the University. But as parents of future college students, or as alumni of La Salle, we're supposed to blindly accept we are all Catholic racists? It's disgusting.
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Feb 23, 2022 19:28:06 GMT -5
Post by JoeFedorowicz on Feb 23, 2022 19:28:06 GMT -5
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Post by big5explorer on Feb 23, 2022 20:58:53 GMT -5
I'm having a difficult time understanding what redlining policy had to do with generations of Catholics being labeled as anti-Black. I'd guess most White Philly Catholics had no idea that was going on. And it certainly didn't help them earn money for their homes any easier.
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Feb 23, 2022 21:16:47 GMT -5
Post by JoeFedorowicz on Feb 23, 2022 21:16:47 GMT -5
You connected dots that I didn't mean to connect. You said this:
I wasn't insinuating that the people that owned the homes were racists. But racist policies allowed more white people (who, at least in this city, were predominantly Catholic) to own homes because black people could not.
I'm getting through another book right now, but this might be next one. Will come back with a book report.
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Post by gymrat67 on Feb 24, 2022 9:53:20 GMT -5
One can only imagine how welcome Ms. O'Connell now is at her Family's Thanksgiving and Christmas gatherings.
I hope / trust that she waited until after her grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles, cousins and siblings ( if any ) passed on before publishing her " Woke " Manifesto, effectively throwing her entire Family under the bus.
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smh
Feb 24, 2022 12:28:11 GMT -5
Post by SICguy84 on Feb 24, 2022 12:28:11 GMT -5
What is the point of these posts Wokification of our fine Roman Catholic institution. What happens when woke ideology conflicts with Catholicism at La Salle?
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Post by peacetoes on Feb 25, 2022 8:48:08 GMT -5
I don’t want her teaching my kid. La Salle is going woke. This path will lead to certain death. The school is killing itself all in front of our eyes. Caitlin Taylor (Criminal Justice) is another one...all about 'defund the police' and 'prison abolition' stances. I agree; the woke path is going to make it very difficult for the new President to accomplish his $$ goals. Many of us do not identify with the school anymore. So many La Salle kids are first generation kids. I wonder how many have a cop for a dad or mom and show up to have woke Caitlin Taylor as a professor.
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Feb 25, 2022 13:42:01 GMT -5
Post by hykos1045 on Feb 25, 2022 13:42:01 GMT -5
I don’t want her teaching my kid. La Salle is going woke. This path will lead to certain death. The school is killing itself all in front of our eyes. another one...all about 'defund the police' and 'prison abolition' stances. I agree; the woke path is going to make it very difficult for the new President to accomplish his $$ goals. Many of us do not identify with the school anymore. So many La Salle kids are first generation kids. I wonder how many have a cop for a dad or mom and show up to have woke Taylor as a professor. No matter where you go to college, students might (EDIT: SHOULD) encounter professors that have different world views. But the ones saying "I don't want you teaching my kid" are basing this on what, only reading the title of some article, and not its contents? If going into a class like that you would be predestined to fail. Here is one I am particularly interested in: Wood, J., Sorg, E.T., Groff, E.R., Ratcliffe, J.H. and Taylor, C.J. (2014). Cops as treatment providers: Realities and ironies of police work in a foot patrol experiment. Policing & Society: An International Journal of Research and Policy, 24 (3): 362-379. I'll maintain that if some department or the administration leans in that political direction, it doesn't automatically equate to losing donations. sites.northwestern.edu/npep/background-on-mass-incarceration/dailynorthwestern.com/2022/01/06/campus/northwestern-ends-fy-2021-with-more-than-16-billion-in-net-assets/#:~:text=The%20University's%20endowment%20saw%20a,year%2C%20according%20to%20the%20report.
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Post by peacetoes on Feb 25, 2022 15:12:10 GMT -5
another one...all about 'defund the police' and 'prison abolition' stances. I agree; the woke path is going to make it very difficult for the new President to accomplish his $$ goals. Many of us do not identify with the school anymore. So many La Salle kids are first generation kids. I wonder how many have a cop for a dad or mom and show up to have woke Taylor as a professor. No matter where you go to college, students might (EDIT: SHOULD) encounter professors that have different world views. But the ones saying "I don't want you teaching my kid" are basing this on what, only reading the title of some article, and not its contents? If going into a class like that you would be predestined to fail. Here is one I am particularly interested in: Wood, J., Sorg, E.T., Groff, E.R., Ratcliffe, J.H. and Taylor, C.J. (2014). Cops as treatment providers: Realities and ironies of police work in a foot patrol experiment. Policing & Society: An International Journal of Research and Policy, 24 (3): 362-379. I'll maintain that if some department or the administration leans in that political direction, it doesn't automatically equate to losing donations. sites.northwestern.edu/npep/background-on-mass-incarceration/dailynorthwestern.com/2022/01/06/campus/northwestern-ends-fy-2021-with-more-than-16-billion-in-net-assets/#:~:text=The%20University's%20endowment%20saw%20a,year%2C%20according%20to%20the%20report. To an extent... Listen, I love the school - across the board (my wife and I went there, 30+ year friendships, experience, etc.). We are in the top tiers of our class for donating on an annual basis... I go there as often as I can and support it in several other non-monetary ways. I will always support the school, even though it sometimes feels like putting water in a bucket with holes in the bottom - not to mention fighting through the high level of surrounding apathy that has always plagued the school, much more so now. Not to mention all of the 'typical La Salle' stuff (like, for example, having a home basketball game and the school store is closed). Yes, I get that we need diverse viewpoints. My point was that we are likely turning people off if we push the woke narrative too far (diminishing returns). Enrollment is down and the $$ issues are also well documented. La Salle always pumped out kids who outworked kids with supposedly 'better' degrees and developed a reputation at the area companies and service firms that they are well-prepared and hard working. When I was there, dorms were bursting and 3 people had to occupy a lounge converted to a dorm room, the library was a year or two old, school store / convenience store upgraded and the townhomes were new. We should realize who/what we were when we were more successful and stop trying to be something else. People went to La Salle for a solid education to enable them to develop and work hard in the real world. If kids want to go to a thinktank, they are much more likely going to Bucknell or Swarthmore, etc. We do not have that reputation. I feel as if we are (at least during the Colleen years) trying to turn the school into something it is not and in the process turning off the few people who remember the La Salle they loved and got them to a point in life where they have the $$ to keep it alive.
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Feb 26, 2022 12:00:51 GMT -5
louth likes this
Post by gymrat67 on Feb 26, 2022 12:00:51 GMT -5
Talk about ' re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic '. The print editions of the Phila. Inquirer newspaper are on life support. The number of home delivery subscribers of the daily print editions are at an all-time low and rapidly declining. The Phila. Inquirer recently sold it's 680,000 + sq. ft. Schuylkill printing plant in West Conshohocken and has now out-sourced all of it's printing to a vendor ( Gannett ) in Cherry Hill , NJ.
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Post by Fastchuck on Feb 26, 2022 12:20:11 GMT -5
I have a go to guy on matters of theology, religion and ethics. My brother is a professor of Theology at a Catholic seminary. Since my family is rather diverse religiously it makes for energetic conversations at family reunions. He has published 2 books on the Church's views on sex and sexual ethics. In discussing the Church's role in the sexual abuse of children by priests he has stated the obvious. First, the Church condemns such behavior. Second, the Church is populated by people as fallible as the rest of the human race. However, this problem was not just some priests being weak and sinful. It was a systemic problem manifested by how the Church handled it. The pope has called on the Church to examine itself not just on matters of faith and morality but also on how its institutions play a role in possibly promoting or at least allowing such behavior to occur. It also needs to examine how it deals with individuals found to be guilty of such offenses. Catholic scholars such as my brother have made sexual ethics and how the Church explains its edicts a focus of study.
I believe that Dr. O'Connell and others at Catholic institutions of higher learning are following a similar call from the Church in studying racism and social justice. In 2018 the US Catholic Bishops issued a pastoral letter on racism. Aside from a condemnation of racism it formed subcommittees to continue the study of various aspects of racism including criminal justice reform, restorative justice and mass incarceration. The Bishops urged its institutions to educate all Catholics on these issues through a restorative justice lens.
Like the rest of the country the Church and Catholic colleges have a history of racism. Georgetown once owned slaves and survived as an institution by selling them. Most Catholic schools followed societal norms and provided segregated education at one point. It is ludicrous to think that we live a post racial world. Examination of Catholic doctrine and institutions is certainly a valid course of study even if we do not like what it says about ourselves.
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smh
Mar 1, 2022 14:18:00 GMT -5
via mobile
1801olney likes this
Post by 23won on Mar 1, 2022 14:18:00 GMT -5
Her words can hurt you only if you let it happen.
She should have chosen cheap Irish Catholic therapy - confession - over the self loathing and angst. Apparently the sins here are the sins of others in her family, not her. How convenient.
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