In Defense Of Notre Dame
On his June 14th entry to his blog entitled "Catholic Spotted at University of Notre Dame," Tito wrote a satirical piece about how his friend, Bill, Director of Young Adult Ministry for the Archdiocese of Galveston-Houston, could not find one loyal Catholic at the University of Notre Dame and thus he could no longer cheer for the Fighting Irish. While I am not immune to humor (in fact, some have criticized my saint-of-the-day blogs as too silly), one cannot readily laugh at mean-spirited or factually misleading "Catholic" treatises. Does one not get offended when hearing "pedophile-priest" or "Pope Benedict Nazi" jokes? Well, despite the misadventures of Father McBrien, anti-Notre Dame raves are not much different.
Truly, the University of Notre Dame is emblematic of American Catholicism as a whole, with a handful of saints and scoundrels at either end of the spectrum and a wide range of devotion in between. But unlike many Catholic places of higher learning, Notre Dame (once dubbed "The City of the Blessed Sacrament") has scores of church, crypt and dorm Masses going on literally around the clock, as well as a bona-fide Marian shrine, the grotto. Thus, to say all those who attend daily Mass under the Dome, or every soul who makes a regular pilgrimage to the grotto is not a devout Catholic is certainly ridiculous, if not sacrilegious. And, in the latter grotto group, count Irish head football coach Charlie Weis. After his grueling sixteen-hour work days, coach makes his slow nightly walk to the shrine, where he prays not so much for his football team as his family, especially his autistic daughter Hannah.
And so, instead of taking easy pot shots at the hot shot Notre Dame media beasts and priests, let's try another approach. We can keep the strong core of committed Catholics, as well as root out the radical rascals, by simply praying for Our Lady's university-and rooting for her team.
What's that you say? Well, in the 30s and 40s, coaches such as Michigan's Fritz Chrysler, refused to play Notre Dame, saying its national Catholic fan and recruiting base gave Notre Dame an unfair advantage. Not only do I agree with Chryler's Old Notre Dame critique, I'll go one step further by saying that when those thousands of rosary prayers used to pour in every Saturday to aid the Irish gridiron performance, I think Our Lady (the team's #1 fan) was wise (and merciful) enough to save some of those Aves for the University's other needs too.
And, speaking of wisdom, Coach Weis, besides being an offensive coaching genius, now not only has his players raise their helmets in praise of Mary at the end of each game, but also has his charges singing the "Notre Dame Our Mother" song to honor her after every contest, win or lose. So cheer up Tito (ND prayer is already having its effect), and once again Cheer, Cheer for ol' Notre Dame!
Thomas Augustine O'Toole was born in Chicago and after attending Catholic grammar and high school, he was accepted into the University of Notre Dame. Tom majored in English, but also made the Irish varsity tennis team as a walk-on (a feat statistically rarer than Rudy's) and was also the sports editor of Notre Dame's Scholastic magazine, where his story "Reflections on the Game" won the award for Best Sports Feature for the Indiana Collegiate Press Association.
Tom's innovative writings on the connection between faith and sports ("Cathletics") has been praised by the Papal Nuncio, and his groundbreaking book Champions of
Source: http://ezinearticles.com/
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