Villanova University

[pazdziernik]

Have you read that Villanova University, a Catholic school dedicated on Thursday a new addition of their library to a woman who committed suicide and admitted to killing her 6 month-old daughter who had Down Syndrome?

here a link to the story:
www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=16769

According to the article, “A number of students are ‘very upset’ over the university’s decisionÊ”

 

[MugenOne]

And she blamed it on post partum depression! How comes people can’t stand up and take responsibility for their own action nowaday? I guess it is easy to blame it on some post something depression. You know what?! I am gonna kill someone and blame it on post Catholic forum depression

MugenOne

 

[Jermosh]

MugenOne:

And she blamed it on post partum depression! How comes people can’t stand up and take responsibility for their own action nowaday? I guess it is easy to blame it on some post something depression. You know what?! I am gonna kill someone and blame it on post Catholic forum depression

MugenOne

So are you saying that post partum depression is not real? Sorry but it is real, and only thru proper training and awareness can it be caught in time and diagnosed. With early intervention it can be cured.

 

[condan]

Jermosh:

So are you saying that post partum depression is not real? Sorry but it is real, and only thru proper training and awareness can it be caught in time and diagnosed. With early intervention it can be cured.

Mental illness still does not excuse murder. Some crimes are so heinous that they eradicate all other accomplishments in one’s life. This is the case here. It is wildly inappropriate to memorialize this poor woman and a desacration of the memory of her innocent child, so brutally killed by the person who should have protected her from all harm with every fiber of her body.

It is also an insult to the parents of disabled children everywhere as well as a scandal of grave proportion at a supposedly “Catholic” school.

 

[John_Higgins]

condan:

Mental illness still does not excuse murder.

No, but it does remove the culpability from murder, and it renders mortal sin highly unlikely.

John

 

[pazdziernik]

I think the point is not to judge culpability of this woman who the university is honoring but rather to see why they honor her? Shouldn’t they have selected a recent Catholic intellectual saint such as Edith Stein?

Boston College near Boston has a building named after the former speaker of the House Tip O’Neil. Why are many Catholic schools unwilling to name their buildings after saints?

 

[condan]

John Higgins:

No, but it does remove the culpability from murder, and it renders mortal sin highly unlikely.

John

So I’m an alcoholic and a drug addict, identified as a disease and a disability, and I run someone down and kill him. I’m not “culpable” and I’ve not comitted a mortal sin?

Good to keep that in mind. Thanks.

 

[John_Higgins]

So I’m an alcoholic and a drug addict, identified as a disease and a disability,

Ah, but not mental illness.

John

PS: For your homework, review the conditions which must be in place for a person to commit a mortal sin.

 

[pazdziernik]

condan:

So I’m an alcoholic and a drug addict, identified as a disease and a disability, and I run someone down and kill him. I’m not “culpable” and I’ve not comitted a mortal sin?

Good to keep that in mind. Thanks.

It may lessen your culpability but not eradicate it. If you choose to get drunk and choose to take drugs and then choose to drive under these conditions then you would very likely would be fully culpable for any harm to others you may cause. A person who is an alcoholic and a drug addict but who is sober and drives recklessly would be fully culpable, all things being equal.

Villanova University chose to honor a woman who committed suicide and killed her child. Why not choose one who is an example of sanctity? Or who has overcome past problems and became holy? St. Paul and St. Ignatius of Loyola are two examples of saints who overcame a sinful past to become outstanding models of holiness. We don’t continually question their culpability for their past sins, rather we look at the holiness that they have achieved. Villanova University should have used the same criteria in my estimation.

 

[katherine2]

pazdziernik:

I think the point is not to judge culpability of this woman who the university is honoring but rather to see why they honor her? Shouldn’t they have selected a recent Catholic intellectual saint such as Edith Stein?

Boston College near Boston has a building named after the former speaker of the House Tip O’Neil. Why are many Catholic schools unwilling to name their buildings after saints?

Because money talks. Franciscan University at Stubenville has seven buildings named after people whose outstanding virtue is their money.

 

[John_Higgins]

It’s a small study space in a large library which is named for an Augustinian priest. The “Mine Ener Memorial Study Space” is hardly going to cause scandal to the Villanova or surrounding Pennsylvania Catholic community.

John

 

[John_Higgins]

Further, I was looking around for names of buildings on Catholic campuses. Here are a few library names for some Catholic schools:

Marquette Rev. John P. Raynor, S.J.
Villanova Rev. Daniel P. Falvey, OSA
St Louis U Pius XII
Gonzaga Ralph and Helen Foley (parents of former SoH Tom Foley), former library after Bing Crosby
Notre Dame Rev. Theodore Hesburgh, CSC

Not any saints here.

John

 

[condan]

pazdziernik:

It may lessen your culpability but not eradicate it. If you choose to get drunk and choose to take drugs and then choose to drive under these conditions then you would very likely would be fully culpable for any harm to others you may cause. A person who is an alcoholic and a drug addict but who is sober and drives recklessly would be fully culpable, all things being equal.

Villanova University chose to honor a woman who committed suicide and killed her child. Why not choose one who is an example of sanctity? Or who has overcome past problems and became holy? St. Paul and St. Ignatius of Loyola are two examples of saints who overcame a sinful past to become outstanding models of holiness. We don’t continually question their culpability for their past sins, rather we look at the holiness that they have achieved. Villanova University should have used the same criteria in my estimation.

Unfortunately, when you commit suicide, you close the door on any possibility of achieving holiness to overshadow your past sins. Sorry, but I don’t buy the concept of mental illness releasing someone from responsibility for his actions, especially actions that are so horrible.

My heart goes out to this poor woman and may God have mercy on her soul but to give her a place of honor turns my stomach… as a woman, as a mother and as someone who is very closely touched by profound disability. Wouldn’t something like a donation in her name to a home for unwed mothers or Down’s Syndrome children be more appropriate?

Unfortunately, this woman’s lasting legacy will not be her abilities as a professor and mentor but the fact that she slit her child’s throat. We are too quick to overlook our failings in the name of political correctness. If this were a man who killed his child, would the reaction be the same? Who is to say that men don’t suffer similar stress upon the addition of a child, especially one who requires more care than one had anticipated or is capable of. (Personally, it is my observation that there were other factors at work that contributed to her losing control.)

Also, the fact that she was upset because she didn’t know her child was DS prior to birth racks up no points in her favor.

 

[John_Higgins]

CCC:

2283 We should not despair of the eternal salvation of persons who have taken their own lives. By ways known to him alone, God can provide the opportunity for salutary repentance. The Church prays for persons who have taken their own lives.

The email that reached all Villanova students on Jan. 17 contained a startling invitation. It called on students to attend yesterday’s dedication of the Mine Ener Memorial in a Falvey Library study lounge. Many Villanovans had not heard the late professor’s name for over a year, but nearly everyone remembers the news flurry surrounding Ener’s August 2003 death and the events that preceded it.

Ener’s story inspired shock, sadness, and disbelief. Unfortunately, the newly unveiled memorial, well-intentioned as it may be, has spread confusion throughout the Villanova community. Why? In a word, vagueness.

The e-mail was worded as casually as an invitation to an open house. It did nothing to acknowledge the emotional sensitivity concerning the memorial’s subject, nor did it anticipate the questions that would inevitably cross the mind of every student who read the email: What exactly does the committee behind the project hope to communicate through this tribute? What will the memorial consist of? And - though it’s an uncomfortable inquiry to pose - is it appropriate to construct on this campus a memorial connected with such a controversial episode?

Certainly, it’s easy to understand why the e-mail made no mention of the tragedies that occurred at the end of Ener’s life - no one wants to taint a celebration of a person by dredging up mistakes or misfortunes that don’t necessarily represent his or her legacy.

But it was irresponsible of the committee to expect a positive response from the student body without elaborating further on the memorial’s mission.

Is the memorial designed to honor Ener’s contributions to the University and insure that she is remembered for something other than scandal? Is it meant to promote awareness of postpartum depression, which may have played a role in the sad conclusion to Ener’s story? Is it simply intended to give closure to a loss that devastated Ener’s students, colleagues, friends and family? Creating and funding this project obviously required a good amount of money, energy and faith in the importance of the memorial.

Had the committee taken the time to share that faith with the student body, a far greater number of those e-mail invitations may have been gladly accepted.

From The Villanovan, January 21, 2005

Looks like the students are puzzled too.

John

 

[Jermosh]

I never stated she should be excused. I did state that the illness is real, whether or not you feel it is ok or not matters little.
The fact is it needs to be adressed because it is a real illness and it does kill people. It can be easliy diagnosed before any harm happens. I think this memorial does that.

 

[condan]

Jermosh:

I never stated she should be excused. I did state that the illness is real, whether or not you feel it is ok or not matters little.
The fact is it needs to be adressed because it is a real illness and it does kill people. It can be easliy diagnosed before any harm happens. I think this memorial does that.

Does what?

 

[Jermosh]

condan:

Does what?

Brings to light the results of the desease. Wheither you agree or not. There were 2 victims in this case, one was innocent the other was not of sound mind.

 

[GoodKnight1443]

Once one murders a helpless child and then commits suicide, a hall should not be dedicated to that person. How ever if the University had keep the tragedy in mind and perhaps started a fund or a program to help treat women with potpartum depression to prevent the horror from happening again may have been a more appropriate gesture.

 

[Jermosh]

You may be right. But the point I am trying to state is that it is a real disease, and it needs to be recognized as preventable, if early signs are caught in time. For someone to state the women who are afflicted by this kill on there own free will is an outright fallacy.

 

[condan]

Jermosh:

Brings to light the results of the desease. Wheither you agree or not. There were 2 victims in this case, one was innocent the other was not of sound mind.

Like Andrea Yates didn’t “bring light” to the disease. Please. The intent of the memorial is to highlight this professors accomplishments. It doesn’t mention her “disease” or the actions it caused.