As some here may have heard, President Obama will be the commencement speaker at my alma mater on 5/17. Rumor has it that there are those in the Church hierarchy, including the local bishop and Obama's hometown cardinal, who are unhappy that this event will occur. A homily that Pope John Paul II gave at Chicago's Grant Park on 10/5/79 offers the president some excellent material that could be utilized in his Notre Dame speech.
I covered JP II's Grant Park Mass for the Notre Dame student radio station. It was the day after my 21st birthday, and I was, admittedly, still feeling some aftereffects of the previous evening's celebration. I have, however, never forgotten the pontiff's use of the Latin phrase "E pluribus unum" as his theme for his homily that day.
E pluribus unum has been our national motto since 1776, and it has, obviously, been on our coins and our currency since colonial times. Roughly translated as: "Out of Many, One," it summarizes our core national ideal. JP II used the term to considerable effect in his homily:
In the first two centuries of your history as a nation, you have travelled a long road, always in search of a better future, in search of stable employment, in search of a homestead. You have travelled "From sea to shining sea" to find your identity, to discover each other along the way, and to find your own place in this immense country.
Your ancestors came from many different countries across the oceans to meet here with the people of different communities that were already established here. In every generation, the process has been repeated: new groups arrive, each one with a different history, to settle here and become part of something new. The same process still goes on when families move from the south to the north, from the east to the west. Each time they come with their own past to a new town or a new city, to become part of a new community. The pattern repeats itself over and over: E pluribus unum—the many form a new unity.
Yes, something new was created every time. You brought with you a different culture and you contributed your own distinctive richness to the whole; you had different skills and you put them to work, complementing each other, to create industry, agriculture and business; each group carried with it different human values and shared them with the others for the enrichment of your nation. E pluribus unum: you became a new entity, a new people, the true nature of which cannot be adequately explained as a mere putting together of various communities.
This excerpt would fit an Obama speech like a glove. It fits his own ethnic background and the electoral coalition that he assembled last year. It fits even more the kind of country that he presumably hopes to help us to become in the next (hopefully) 8 years.
His mastery of the art of political jujitsu is one of Obama's greatest skills. This speech clearly allows him w/ a golden opportunity to utilize that skill. The hamhandedness and the obvious double standards of the likes of Cardinal George, Bishop D'Arcy, and TV talking heads like Pat Buchanan cry out for a calm, reasoned, and reflective reply. Borrowing a theme from a pope who was widely admired by those Obama opponents would the perfect focal point for such a reply.
Given the objections that have been raised, the Notre Dame speech may be Obama's most important address since his Inaugural. These objections involve much bigger questions than the mere awarding of an honorary degree. These objections are being raised by people who don't like the fact that Obama carried Catholic voters in 2008 and who do not wish to see him repeat that feat in 2012. They are also being raised by people who don't like the fact that there is a Catholic VP, a Catholic House Speaker, and numerous other Catholics in Congress who do not follow what has essentially become a party line on the thorny issue of abortion.
This speech will be the biggest one presented by a Democrat at Notre Dame since Mario Cuomo's 1984 speech about that thorny issue. Cuomo and Obama have obvious parallels. They both rose to national prominence w/ Keynote Addresses 20 years apart. Their speechmaking has featured a depth and an intellectual rigor that set them apart from most any other national Democratic figure in recent memory. Cuomo's Notre Dame speech was one that was engendered considerable analysis, reflection, and debate, and Obama's speech could do the same.
Successful presidents often tend to be blessed w/ a hapless political oppostion. Obama surely has benefitted from such a blessing, and that haplessness has never been more apparent than it has been in this controversy. The small-mindedness of the opposition to this speech calls for the use of a big theme like the rather unique diversity of our national identity.
This approach could also subtly address the ongoing debate about the nature of Catholicism. A nominally universal Church should unhesitatingly welcome a dialogue w/ a newly elected POTUS who obviously takes his Christian faith seriously. The fact that the POTUS in question has supported public policies in one field that are at variance w/ Church teachings should not be deemed to be cause for excluding the POTUS from speaking at universities that are affiliated w/ the Church. Such attempted exclusion evinces a Church "leadership" that has lost faith in its own ability to persuasively enunciate its teachings.
I look forward to hearing this speech one month hence, and I hope that the speaker will utilize such visibly relevant material in that speech. Obama could also, obviously, refer to the fact that the John Paul II homily was given at a location that will always be near and dear to him and to his family. Given that set of circumstances, this material is, quite simply, too good not to utilize.