Jesuit-Catholic Identity

Middle States Working Group
July 1, 1999

The Magis document commits Loyola to strive toward excellence as a Catholic, Jesuit university. The document thus claims that there is or ought to be something distinctive about the way that Loyola goes about educating its students that is traceable to its history as a school founded by the Society of Jesus and incorporating, from the 1970s forward, the charism of the Religious Sisters of Mercy. In the days when the Society of Jesus owned the college, when the President-Rector was appointed by the Provincial of the Maryland Province, and when scores of Jesuits and other religious taught and served as administrators, it was comparatively easy to define what made Loyola distinctive. Today, when a student very well might graduate from Loyola without having been taught by a single Jesuit or Sister of Mercy, identifying what exactly makes Loyola Catholic and Jesuit is much more challenging. Facing that challenge--defining what it is to be a "classic Jesuit university" in 1998 and beyond, and establishing criteria according to which Loyola may judge its success or failure in living up to its claim to be distinctive--is crucial to Loyola's future.

While one response to the challenge must be the aggressive recruitment of Jesuits, that effort cannot and should not be the College's sole concern. This is the case not only because fewer and fewer qualified Jesuits are available to serve in the twenty-eight schools that comprise the Association of Jesuit Colleges and Universities, but also because the Society of Jesus itself has fully and firmly committed itself (most recently in Decree Thirteen of the 34th General Congregation [GC34]) to a policy of full empowerment of the lay faculty of these institutions. This is the spirit out of which the "Jesuit-Lay cooperation" movement was launched some ten years ago. At the heart of the Jesuit-Lay movement is the assumption that the responsibility for the Jesuit character of Jesuit higher education rests in the hands of the people--all the people--who actually do the work in the institutions.

At the same time, "cooperation" or "partnership" in Jesuit higher education implies a two-way street, and another document from GC34 calls on Jesuits to be reminders that an institution of higher learning, "in order to call itself Jesuit" needs to be "accountable" to the Society, to determine "whether or not its dynamics are being developed in line with the Jesuit mission" (Decree Seventeen). The real challenge, then, beyond the recruitment of Jesuits, is to develop the means through which genuine partnership in mission might be carried on productively, so that an authentically Jesuit way of educating--faithful to a rich tradition and responsive to new challenges alike--may pervade the life of the institution. For Loyola to continue to be what it says it is, then, its lay faculty, staff and administrators--professionals who are increasingly drawn from a wide range of graduate programs and intellectual traditions, and who represent the entire spectrum of educational, cultural, and religious backgrounds--need to take responsibility for sustaining the traditions that the institution claims as its own.

The college has taken several steps in the past ten years toward fostering the kind of discussions out of which this new sense of a shared mission eventually will emerge, if it is to emerge at all. As our strategic plan would put it, however, it is time to strive for much more. First, Loyola could do more toward fostering knowledge of the traditions by which it claims to be enlivened. In part because of its success in recruiting excellent faculty from far and wide, what might be called "Ignatian literacy" has suffered. More and more members of the Loyola community have no previous experience with Jesuit, Catholic, or even church-related education, and therefore stand in need of opportunities to deepen their understanding of the project into which they were invited at hiring, and to which they renew their commitment with each annual contract that they accept. Part of the problem in developing such opportunities and programs in the past has been a concern that too clear a definition of or too much emphasis on what makes Loyola a Jesuit, Catholic university might imply a threat to academic freedom, or lead to an interpretation of our identity within which only Catholics or Christians would have a genuine role to play in mission. Loyola as a university must always take such concerns with the utmost seriousness. Whatever Loyola's mission is as a Catholic university, it must be emphasized in the strongest possible terms that it is as a Catholic university that the mission must be fulfilled. This does not mean, however, that the university cannot or should not be as clear and outspoken about its identity as possible. In fact, nothing fuels anxiety about Jesuit, Catholic identity more quickly than uncertainty about the terms we use. It is time, then, for Loyola to craft a mission statement that lays out clearly and forcefully the college's sense of its educational purpose, couched in terms that neither dilute the foundational spirit of the enterprise, nor alienate colleagues of other religious traditions (or of no religious tradition) who regard themselves capable of full participation, mutatis mutandis, in an educational mission that dedicates teaching and learning ad maiorem Dei gloriam.

This is not the place to set forth that ideal mission statement. It may be worthwhile, however, to note a few characteristics that a mission statement true to the Jesuit, Catholic foundations of Loyola would certainly emphasize. In 1599, the Spanish Jesuit Diego Ledesma listed four reasons why the Society of Jesus involved itself in education: 1) to give students "advantages for practical living"; 2) to "contribute to the right government of public affairs"; 3) to "give ornament, splendor, and perfection to the rational nature" of humanity; 4) to be "a bulwark of religion and guide man most surely and easily to the achievement of his last end." Ledesma's definition focuses clearly on what Jesuit education hopes for its students, and any mission statement faithful to the Jesuit spirit must keep students and our responsibility to them firmly at its center. With a bit of "translation" into late twentieth-century American terms, Ledesma's words still point clearly to key distinguishing characteristics of a Jesuit education: 1) it is eminently practical, focused on providing students with the knowledge and skills to excel in whatever field they choose; 2) it is not merely practical, but concerns itself also with questions of values, with educating men and women to be good citizens and good leaders, concerned with the common good, and able to use their education for the service of faith and promotion of justice; 3) it celebrates the full range of human intellectual power and achievement, confidently affirming reason, not as antithetical to faith, but as its necessary complement; 4) it places all that it does firmly within a Christian understanding of the human person as a creature of God whose ultimate destiny is beyond the human. To put these goals in the words of the Decrees of the 34th General Congregation, Jesuit education encourages students and their teachers alike not only to seek knowledge for its own sake, but also to ask continually the key question "Knowledge for what?" It also insists that answers to that question be formed in the context of vigorous intellectual activity that excludes no evidence from the investigation, including the evidence of the deposit of Christian faith. (1)

It must be acknowledged that a strong commitment to such educational ideals presents a tremendous challenge to the institution. To assert the Jesuit-Catholic identity of the institution is the opposite of a complaisant retreat to snug verities. In an age valuing academic specialization, our mission calls for dedication to our students--both undergraduate and graduate--as whole persons. For undergraduate education, this entails a challenge to faculty to teach not just the subject, but the student. It calls us to embody in our teaching and research what the presence of the core curriculum asserts--that knowledge is one. For graduate education, it challenges us to educate men and women not only to be professionally competent, but to be leaders in the application of excellent professional skills in promoting the common good. In a time and in a city beset by social inequality, its calls us to use our intellectual talents "to reach out with courage and love" to "the needy of our time," as the Sisters of Mercy would say. In a nation in which "identity" is increasingly defined in ways that promote and exacerbate divisions among people on the basis of race, gender, ethnicity, or social class, they challenge us to be the sort of place where genuinely new thinking about what finally unites us may emerge.

In more concrete terms, the mission calls us at a minimum to assess and reassess the strength of the relationship between our claim to be a Jesuit and Catholic institution and what we do in five major areas of the college: hiring and professional development, pedagogy and research, service and service-learning programs, student development, and diversity initiatives.

At the heart of the university's mission is the teaching and research of the faculty. It goes without saying, then, that the sine qua non for Loyola's future as a Jesuit-Catholic university is a strong faculty, dedicated to teaching, and excellently trained in the full range of academic specialties. Without academic excellence, everything else is window-dressing. Beyond that, departments need to recruit from among excellent candidates people who are willing and able to think seriously about their work in significant relation to the traditions of spirited inquiry and dedicated service that form the heart of our identity. Such candidates cannot be identified solely through attention to such evidence as religious affiliation or previous experience with Jesuit, Catholic, or church-related education; therefore, the College chooses to cast its net as widely as possible. Because it chooses not to limit itself exclusively to hiring candidates with previous experience of its traditions, while at the same time asking everyone to take responsibility for the mission, the College is obligated to provide sufficient opportunities for all its members to learn about and to discuss the implications of its traditions. Some work is being done in this area. A committee on Jesuit-Lay cooperation has existed since the late 1980s, providing a mechanism for lay faculty and Jesuits to discuss areas of common concern. For the past three years, the "Education Marked by the Sign of the Cross" series has sponsored an annual one-day retreat for faculty. Since 1993, Loyola has been a sustaining member of Collegium, a consortium of some fifty Catholic colleges and universities, and has sent one or two faculty members each year to Collegium's intensive summer institute on Faith and Intellectual Life. More recently, the college's new Catholic Studies program has begun to sponsor lectures, panel discussions, films, retreats, and liturgies out of which has begun to emerge a community of colleagues dedicated to exploring the intersection of faith and reason in their lives as researchers and educators. As worthwhile as these programs are, however, they have not been successful in attracting the interest of the majority of the faculty.

Hiring people who are enthusiastic about Jesuit education is critical, but we need to change our perspective to see hiring as the first step in a career of continued intellectual, personal, and professional development. What is needed is an organized, systematic program of orientation that would be open and attractive to all faculty, and that would allow for continuing education throughout the faculty member's tenure at the college. Some Jesuit schools have in place or are exploring programs that give new faculty release time or a stipend in the first semester in return for participation in a "mission seminar." This may be an option for Loyola to explore. Among possibilities for encouraging senior faculty to become involved or to remain involved in exploration of interconnections among their research, teaching, and the mission of the college might be the designation of some portion of faculty development money to fund research projects or course development involving the intersection of faith and intellectual life, issues of justice, or other topics directly related to mission.

The mission's call for an integral approach to the human and to knowledge places demands on our pedagogy and research. Jesuit schools are justifiably proud of the survival of their undergraduate core curricula, and point to the core as evidence of their distinctiveness. But the mere existence of a core says little about the relationship of curriculum to mission. The core at a Jesuit institution, in addition to being strongly weighted toward humanistic studies, and in addition to integrating philosophy and theology, must foster a genuinely cross-disciplinary search for truth. It must be taught by scholars and teachers who are themselves dedicated to the integration of knowledge across disciplines, who ask not just "what," but "why," and who challenge themselves and their students to explore relationships between head and heart, intellect and emotions, body and spirit, reason and faith. We need to look hard at our core curriculum and ask whether it really is a true core in conception and in practice. Does it embody and encourage an authentically Jesuit pedagogy, focused on the student, concerned with the student's development in mind, body, and spirit, and dedicated to motivating that student "to lead and serve in a diverse world"? At the graduate level, we need to ask whether or not our programs are educating business leaders, educators, counselors, and researchers whose work in their professions and in the community carries the stamp of a Jesuit education.

Loyola's impressive service programs are obviously consonant with the commitment of the Society of Jesus in General Congregations 32 and 34 to "the faith that does justice." Jesuit/Catholic education appropriately issues in action, and the Center for Values and Service provides the opportunities and motivation for a host of students, faculty, and staff to participate in service to those in need. A major challenge facing Loyola is to integrate as closely as possible the service we do with thoughtful, reflective work on the meaning of that service in light of our academic and spiritual traditions. Service-Learning and Service-Leadership initiatives have begun to encourage and effect that integration, and those efforts should continue to find support. In particular, the institution needs to make more explicit the connection between what students, faculty, and staff do in the community and what Loyola stands for as a Jesuit/Catholic educational community. Students need to have the opportunity to explore their service in light of their intellectual and faith development. Faculty should be encouraged to develop courses and conduct research that explores connections between Catholic social teaching, or tenets of Christian humanism, and service.

Ask for a definition of Jesuit pedagogy, and you're likely to get as a first answer that it is "student-centered" and that it treats the student as a "whole person." The strategic plan acknowledges that one of the great challenges facing Loyola is the integration of student-life and academic work. Loyola's mission challenges it to ask, as a recent issue of Conversations magazine put it, whether "the structures of [Jesuit] institutions, including the current division of labor between faculty and student-affairs professionals, allow us to respond in the best way possible to the changing needs of a new generation of students? Or are we sending students mixed signals, encouraging them to compartmentalize their intellectual, social, personal, and religious lives in ways that are inimical to the goal of educating the whole person?" (2) Recent initiatives for improving the experience of students--including especially the Alpha program, with its linking of the functions of professor and academic advisor, its inclusion of an explicitly Ignatian component, and its attempt to provide alternative ways for students to socialize without abusing alcohol--are encouraging. Much more needs to be done. The new Dean of Freshmen will have as an important part of her charge the integration of academics and student life.

One of the most persistent canards in talk about Jesuit and Catholic mission is that an institution's assertion of Catholic identity necessarily involves a trade off with its commitment to cultural and religious diversity and to gender equality. The 34th General Congregation, grounding its message in the Gospel and in the rich tradition of social teaching of the world-wide Church, is explicit:

On cultural diversity--
"We must recognize that our world is increasingly aware of the rights as well as the diversity of cultures, and that each cultural group is properly asserting the qualities of its heritage. We need to respect these diverse cultures in their self-affirmation and to work along with them creatively. In every ministry, we must recognize that the salvific work of God's revelation is already present in every culture and that God will bring it to completion" (GC 34 4.27,2; 27,3).

On religious diversity--
Our educational institutions will conscientize their students on the value of interreligious collaboration and instill in them a basic understanding of and respect for the faith vision of the members of diverse local religious communities, while deepening their own faith response to God.(5.9,8)

On gender equality--
[W]e invite all Jesuits, as individuals and through their institutions, to align themselves in solidarity with women . . . [through] explicit teaching of the essential equality of women and men in Jesuit ministries, especially in schools, colleges, and universities, [and through]support for liberation movements which oppose the exploitation of women and encourage their entry into political and social life . . . .(14.13, par. 373-75)

Clearly, the mission calls us explicitly to value and respect diversity, to work for equality, and to engage energetically in intercultural and interfaith dialogue and interchange. Loyola has made important strides in increasing the diversity and raising consciousness about diversity on campus. It is time for there to be an explicit, campus-wide discussion of the connection between these efforts and the Jesuit/Catholic mission of the university.

Our campus-wide discussion of our Catholic and Jesuit identity must address another urgent concern. The 34th General Congregation emphatically calls for Jesuit universities to be accountable for their use of the term "Jesuit." In calling for accountability, the Society of Jesus is taking seriously the American educational tradition, which uses peer review and outcomes assessment to guarantee that programs and institutions accomplish what they claim to do. It makes no sense to proclaim a deeper commitment to Jesuit/Catholic identity without holding ourselves accountable for our success in fulfilling that commitment.

The call for accountability immediately raises the question, "accountability to whom?" No external legislated accreditor, no panel of peer reviewers currently exists to judge successes or failures in our quest to become a classic Jesuit university and a national Catholic university. With its new strategic plan, Loyola has begun a serious reflection of its Jesuit Catholic identity. However, reflection without operational action will not sustain that identity.

We recommend that Loyola take its lead from the American intellectual tradition of peer review. To do so, Loyola should establish a clear mechanism for evaluating our successes and failures in living up to its self definition. We recommend that the College immediately begin a discussion under the leadership of the President, the Rector, and representatives of the entire campus community. This discussion would be charged with two specific outcomes: (1) producing a definition of what it means for Loyola College to be a Jesuit, Catholic university, and (2) developing over the next eighteen months an evaluative mechanism consistent with that definition. By fall, 2001, this mechanism should be in place, charged with overseeing the implementation of mission in the five key areas discussed above: hiring and professional development, pedagogy and research, service and service learning programs, student development, and diversity initiatives.

(1) See John W. Padberg, S.J. "Jesuit Education as a Result of Experience," Presence (Fall 1998): 4-8

(2) Brennan O'Donnell, "Puzzling Questions," Conversations 11 (Spring 1997)