Catholic Culture and Our Higher Institutions of Learning (1928)

[354] Who can deny that American Catholic cultural life is at the lowest ebb ever recorded in our history? There are, of course, many reasons for this lamentable condition, and the foremost may be laid without argument to the maelstrom of materialism into which the whole Catholic body is being sucked, to the destruction of innumerable souls. And, alas, there is little to be done about it, so far as removing the cause is concerned, at least during the next few generations. But defensively, we are abominably and culpably negligent. American Catholic culture will look up only when we have leaders active in what should be the centers of our culture, namely the Catholic colleges, the seats of Catholic higher education. But these latter are doubly isolated, both from the influences of Catholic culture in its sources and from the means of disseminating what culture is generated and nurtured from within. Specifically our Catholic colleges are isolated from cultural influences in their sources. What little Catholic historical research, e. g., is carried on, seldom reaches our schools, there being no effective nexus between the researchers and the colleges. In this connection who ever heard of junior branches of the American Catholic Historical Society established in our Catholic colleges for upper classmen? True, the membership would never run into typical American figures, but how else can we expect Catholic culture to trickle ever so little beyond the doors of our institutions of learning?

The same indictment holds for scientific work of all kinds conducted by Catholics, who, either because of a lack of encouragement, or for economic reasons, or because of plain indifference, have neither a direct nor an indirect connection with Catholic colleges and universities. Many who are engaged outside of purely Catholic circles would gladly place at least the fruits of their labors at the disposal of Catholic institutions of learning, which in turn would have to digest and re-assemble such material for further distribution. It is to be hoped that this latter indictment can, in the course of time, be dismissed as regards Catholic anthropological endeavors.

Specifically, our Catholic colleges are hopelessly inadequate in their methods of disseminating and keeping alive Catholic culture. The Catholic Educational Association, for instance, is an air-tight clerical affair which has shut out all lay contacts and influences. One specific problem, which we need not enter into here and which is giving our faithful Catholic educators grey hairs beyond their years, could easily be solved if the Association would but throw open its doors—not its control—to suggestions from lay Catholics who are in a position, as no cleric could possibly be, to help and give assistance. And thus, too, could Catholic culture be canalized to our huge American desert.

Beyond our Catholic halls of learning, Education toils not nor does she spin. Surely the German Fortbildungsschule idea could be used in this country, not for accounting and mathematics and such vocational subjects, but for humanistic study and conference. There is no thought here of education for the masses, a much abused phrase and effort, for the numbers would be small, small to the despair of anyone given to thinking in large figures, as is the American habit. But there are graduates (at least one person of limited acquaintanceship has known such) who would welcome the opportunity to confer with others and with a leader concerning problems, not of adding a dollar or two a day to his wages—an American obsession—but rather by adding to his cultural equipment.

One might add many more suggestions which would assist our Catholic [355] colleges in making themselves the centers of Catholic culture, as they should rightly be; but as there is little likelihood that the present consumption of such suggestions will deplete the few laid down here, the remainder can wait for another day—or, better still, another generation.

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Source: Spectator, "Catholic Culture and Our Higher Institutions of Learning," The Catholic Fortnightly Review 35, no. 18 (Sept. 15, 1928): 354–355.