The Ave Maria Exchanges

 between Dr. Edward Peters and

President Nicholas Healy & (then) Chancellor (Rev.) Joseph Fessio, SJ

     I need hardly say that the eruption of crisis among Christians into the public arena is, at best, unseemly, at worst, scandalous. Indeed, concern for this possibility led many who were being wronged by Ave Maria leadership to long refrain from public disclosure of their plight. 

       Perhaps, too, there was a reluctance to recognize that it was actually happening, and at the hands of men whose publicly stated principles seemed a solid protection against precisely the kind of disregard for personal rights and dignity that so many people contributing to the Ave Maria mission have experienced.

       Nevertheless, we are where we are, and it remains now only to carry on with accuracy and charity toward a just resolution of this crisis. I offer the following materials in pursuit of that goal.

Guide to The Ave Maria Exchanges

1. Preliminary Materials, consisting of:

      A) Link to Michael Rose article on Ave Maria College (May 28);

      B) Link to Peters' Statement to Ave Maria Advisors & Boards (June 1).

2. Peters' Open Reply to Fessio-Healy Open Letter on Ave Maria (June 2-4).

3. Peters' Open Reply to Fessio-Healy Open Letter to Peters (June 4-6).

4. Peters' Brief Reply to AMU Statement as appearing in The Wanderer with

link to Wanderer article (Likoudis) on Monaghan's Intention for AMC (June 25).

5. AMC-Michigan Board Action, and Peters' Reaction (June 28)

6. Some Letters to the Editor: ENP in OSV 10 Oct 04; ENP in NOR Dec 04; Charles Rice in NDN 12 Jan 05

+ + +

1. Preliminary Materials

Michael Rose, "Is Tom Monaghan dismantling another Catholic College?"

Dr. Edward Peters' Statement to Ave Maria Advisors and Boards

2. Dr. Peters' Open Reply to the Fessio-Healy Open Letter on Ave Maria

  3. Healy-Fessio Open Reply to Dr. Edward Peters

with Dr. Peters' response

     For the Healy-Fessio Open Reply of June 4, I have placed their text in gray-shaded boxes, and my responses in white space following. In consideration of third persons, a few of my responses are being withheld for now from public discourse, but are being offered directly to the relevant Ave Maria decision makers.

An Open Reply to Dr. Edward Peters (June 4, 2004)

by AMU President Healy and Chancellor (Rev.) Fessio

Responses of Dr. Peters (6 June)

-----------------

Dr. Peters has issued a statement dated June 1, 2004. It is largely an ad hominen attack on Mr. Tom Monaghan, and we do not intend to respond in kind. However, there are certain serious inaccuracies put forward which are based on misconception or misinformation, and they demand correction.

     My Statement to the Ave Maria Boards and Advisors (1 June) and my Reply to the Fessio-Healy Open Letter (4 June) are very critical of many recent actions taken by Tom Monaghan and his key leadership. I believe, however, that, provided one writes justly, one can also write critically about an individual and his advisors without thereby being guilty of launching an ad hominem attack. In any case, my statements are available to the public and I am content to let readers assess their character and content. My alleged inaccuracies will be addressed below.

First, let us assure Dr. Peters that his son can graduate from Ave Maria College in Ypsilanti; there is simply no plan under consideration which would preclude this, and if Dr. Peters has been led to believe otherwise he is misinformed.

     [Response being reserved for decision-makers, as explained above.]

Some background facts:

1. Mr. Monaghan has determined for some years (at least six) to direct the bulk of his philanthropy to Catholic higher education. His hope was to establish a major new university and originally he planned to offer it a campus at the Domino’s Farms property in Ann Arbor. Despite exhaustive efforts, obtaining the necessary zoning changes proved impossible. With expansion of the existing Ypsilanti campus being impossible, and with no obvious local alternatives, consideration was given to sites outside Ann Arbor and then outside Michigan. By the spring of 2002 Collier County, Florida appeared to offer the preferred location for many, many reasons. Everyone at the College was aware of this prospect before the end of the 2002 spring semester. The Ypsilanti campus would be kept open only to facilitate the start-up of the permanent University in Florida, which would expressly become the continuation of the Ave Maria College mission.

     This does little but reassert positions offered by Fessio-Healy on 2 June, to which I have already replied on 4 June. There is no point in rehearsing those matters again.

2. In November of 2002 the Board of Trustees of Ave Maria College voted to relocate the College to Florida. The Trustee’s unanimous vote was for everything to be transferred to Florida over time. It was not a case of starting a new school in Florida while retaining the old one in Michigan; there never has been a decision to continue Ave Maria College beyond the 2006/07 school year. The administration of Ave Maria College was given instructions by the Board of Trustees to begin the “wind down” process.

     I thought I had made it clear that no one is questioning the fact that these things happened. The real issues include: A) whether the boards exercised significant independence of judgment from the wishes of its dominant donor, Tom Monaghan; B) whether that judgment gave adequate consideration to the needs of and commitments to the many people who had come to Michigan to work for Ave Maria; C) whether the methods that key Ave Maria leaders are using to implement these decisions take adequate account of the dignity (and contributions) of the people being impacted by them; and D) how the unilateral decision to relocate a college justifies also the closure or grave disruption of numerous other Ave Maria projects in the constellation of great works that were here but a short time ago.

3. All involved acknowledge that relocation is complex and brings a measure of uncertainty and difficulty. It is a “pulling up of stakes” and it relies on the cooperation and good will of those involved in the mission. This was a weighty and carefully measured decision made after months of research and expert consultation and certainly should not be characterized as “reckless” or “vacillation” or “abrupt reversal” or a “dishonoring of personal talent and training and years of work” or “unprofessional” or “a shell game” or “contempt for rights and dignity” and it need not become a “crisis”.

     Again, I believe significant questions should be raised about just how carefully these decisions were made by the boards, but I reiterate that no consultation whatsoever was taken with, for example, the IPT about its future (beyond, perhaps how it might suggest implementing the major and repeated changes that were imposed on it) and, it seems, little was taken among many other Ave Maria operations now abolished or in jeopardy. In other words, it seems that most of the people directly affected by these decisions were, for all practical purposes, left out of the decision-making process. I cannot see how the methods used by Ave Maria leadership here could possibly engender “the cooperation and good will of those involved in the mission.”

     [Remainder being reserved for decision-makers, as explained above.]

4. The decision to relocate to Florida was not Mr. Monaghan’s alone. It was strongly supported by the senior administrators at the College, by the Board of Trustees and by more than half the faculty, most of whom have enthusiastically embraced the Florida initiative and already relocated here. It is a decision which we think we were not only entitled to make, but were fully justified in making: the vision is not just about the current students, faculty and staff, but the needs of the Church through this century and beyond.

     [Response being reserved for decision-makers, as explained above.]

5. Dr. Peters and others refer to Ave Maria College as “thriving” and “highly successful”. The reality is that Ave Maria College is incurring a deficit in excess of $ 4 million in the current year. Its tuition charges do not even cover half of its operating expenses. Efforts to find meaningful alternative funding have been unsuccessful. The area of southeast Michigan has a huge number of Catholics, many well-to-do. If there is an unmet need for another Catholic liberal arts college they could and should vote this with their pocketbooks. By way of comparison, Ave Maria University has received well over $13 million in gifts and pledges just in the past six months.

First, I am pleased to see recognized that I am not the only one offering these opinions.

More importantly, while not an AMC faculty member, I was on the AMC campus almost every school day for three years (and of course my son attends there). I can state without hesitation that AMC was “thriving” in the way authentic Catholic higher education thrives: creative, dynamic, orthodox learning handed on in a wide variety of disciplines, in a wide variety of ways. I further reiterate that it appeared “highly successful” to me based on the general knowledge and thinking skills that AMC students displayed in conversations with me, both on and off campus, and on my exposure to faculty (even to the point of my sitting in on senior faculty lectures and attending many of their addresses).

I am surprised to see, though, as if in rebuttal of these assertions, references to the AMC deficit. As I pointed out in a conversation with Fr. Fessio some time ago, no undergraduate college survives on tuition alone, and student tuition and fees typically meet one-third to one-half of most colleges’ real operating expenses. If AMC must perform according to a “for-profit” standard for its survival, then it should shut down. But then, so should the Florida campus. Why is a deficit for AMC treated as a failing, while a deficit for AMU is not even mentioned (unless of course AMU tuition dollars are covering most of its operating expenses.) Would the surprisingly gratuitous swipe at Michigan Catholics apply at least partially to Florida Catholics as well? And do any of the millions of dollars pledged to AMU Florida represent, besides high-profile public relations efforts, at least some good will generated by AMC’s successes, or those of other Ave Maria projects based in Michigan?

I would think that businessmen, if anyone, would appreciate that every start-up venture operates seriously “in the red” for a period of time. Colleges even more so. Certainly, businessmen who take up responsibilities for academic programs should recognize these things.

Finally, assailing AMC with rising deficits when it has been subject to such prolonged public turmoil and uncertainty is quite unfair. Besides the obvious disadvantage that AMC has no alumni base yet, realistically speaking, who will “provide meaningful alternative funding” (i.e., donate) to a college whose "wind down" was announced many months ago? Nor should fund-raising obstacles be presented as a sudden surprise. On the very day I interviewed for my IPT job with President Healy, our conversation turned at one point to fund-raising and I observed that it must be very difficult to raise new money given the public knowledge that the world’s richest Catholic was behind Ave Maria. Not only did President Healy agree with me, he pointed to other examples (that I had not thought of) as to how outsiders wanted to take advantage of Tom Monaghan’s generosity. So, meager fund-raising results should hardly be presented as a surprising failure on the part of AMC. In any case, education is not about turning profits; it’s about using money to create an environment wherein truth can be studied and deepened.

There are many points in no. 6, and they deserve reply:

Dr. Peters apparently believes that Mr. Monaghan has a moral obligation to continue funding the College, Well, yes, I do, for all the reasons raised in these pages.

despite the lack of substantial financial support from the community, Addressed above.

and the rather obvious lack of gratitude on the part of many who have benefited from his charity.

   A) I don’t know to whom this refers, but since it is claimed that there are many such people, perhaps examples will be forthcoming. Nevertheless, I hope this is not meant to imply that the numerous professionals who came to work for Ave Maria are perceived as charity cases on Tom Monaghan’s dole. I thought they were employees, providing services that Monaghan wanted performed in return for salaries they needed to earn. I thought Ave Maria was seen as a way for an enormously wealthy man to make good use of his money, and for enormously talented people to be paid for doing what they love to do and did so well.

   B) The recent negative reactions that Monaghan and some key Ave Maria leadership are likely experiencing should not be seen as “ingratitude” for past actions, but rather as disappointment at their failure to provide for legitimately expected future actions. Analogy: if a man married for many years suddenly announces that he is leaving his wife and children, I don’t imagine the first words out of his wife’s mouth will be a grateful “Thank you for so many happy years!” I think she will instead be stunned that he is announcing his intention not to continue with what she thought, and had some right under the circumstances to expect, was going to continue.

   C) Finally, if one engages in “charitable work”, does one do it for the gratitude? Does this really represent Tom Monaghan's thinking, or that of some in Ave Maria leadership?

Dr. Peters suggests that if Mr. Monaghan cannot afford to operate two institutions of higher learning he should drop Florida and support only AMC in Michigan. Yes, I do, on basically the traditional premise that in case of conflict, those with prior claims have prior rights to see them fulfilled.

This personal judgment flies in the face of the repeated decisions of the AMC Board of Trustees and the preferences of a majority of the AMC faculty. Yes, it is my judgment, though I have already questioned the accuracy and the relevance of the assertions about the board and some faculty.

It is based on an apparent total unawareness of the now irrevocable commitment to build a major new university in eastern Collier County, Florida. As much as anyone who is not part of the inner circle at Ave Maria, I am aware of the "irrevocable commitments" in Florida, but I see it more as a case of inconsistent commitments being made to various people and projects. I perceive the situation as being one wherein (discounting many equivalent factors like to desire to help the Church and education in both places) Tom Monaghan is basically being pulled one direction by personnel of AMC and other Ave Maria operations in Michigan, and in another direction by major landed interests in Florida with corporate resources behind them.

It shows no concern for the 300 students, the more than 30 faculty and the more than 60 staff that will be at AMU in Naples this summer. Well, I see no obligations running from any Michigan personnel to any Florida  personnel, or vice versa for that matter (nor do I think it right to pit those two groups of persons against each other), but rather, I see obligations undertaken by Tom Monaghan, or least by his agents, to both groups. I think it is Ave Maria leadership who needs to show concern for all involved.

7. The students enrolling in 2003 were promised the campus in Ypsilanti would remain open until June of 2007. This promise has never been repudiated nor is it in question. The only issue is how to complete this “teach out” in the best interests of all remaining students at Ave Maria College; not just the 130-150 in Ypsilanti, but the nearly 500 at AMC’s branch campus in Nicaragua. All the explorations of various arrangements, including a possible partnership with Madonna University, have had as the objective the assurance of quality education and the assurance of as high a level of accreditation as possible. Under all of the explored plans, Ave Maria College would remain as a distinct legal entity, operate out of the same campus in Ypsilanti, have the same curriculum and faculty, and issue diplomas in the name of AMC. (The only possible exception to this latter point being the proposed change of name of AMC to Newman College.)

     [Response being reserved for decision-makers, as explained above.]

8. If there is any crisis at Ave Maria College, it is self-created by those who have simply never accepted that the College Trustees voted (repeatedly) to relocate the institution to Florida, and who have been fighting a kind of rear-guard action to undermine this decision. Having privately and now publically (sic) denounced the Ave Maria University leadership and by implication the Ave Maria College Board of Trustees, they ought as a matter of personal integrity seek employment consistent with their judgment. It is fitting that the continuing Ave Maria educational mission have as staff and faculty those who have embraced the vision of the Trustees, and not those embittered by what they perceive as wrongheaded and “reckless” decisions which they cannot abide.

     Naturally, I entirely disagree that I represent a disgruntled group of rear-guard recalcitrants, but one could hardly have seen a clearer example of the “If you don’t like it, leave” attitude that is being exhibited by some in Ave Maria leadership in the face of questions, to say nothing of their impatience with disagreement.

Throughout my writings on Ave Maria, I have striven to balance two sets of related but distinct goods, namely, addressing those matters that impact me and my family, and addressing those that pertain to the general operation and fate of numerous Ave Maria projects, including but not limited to AMC, that I have come to know and admire over three years. While I would use the word “denounce” differently than do these two Ave Maria leaders and not apply it to what I have written, and while I personally have real questions about just how much board decisions can be said to reflect interests of those besides Monaghan and his top personnel, I have little doubt that my writings have caused these persons some disruption.

In any case, I believe that my views, besides being shared by many people smarter and more honorable than me, are exactly the kinds of elemental things that should have been attended to and considered by Ave Maria leadership long ago, in settings free of intimidation, while there were yet available options for mutual accommodation of legitimate needs and interests. I can only say once again that I regret at least as much as anyone else that these urgent points have had to be aired in this manner. Alternatives simply were not offered us. Maybe they will be in the future. At least to others.  

No one here is presumptuous enough (or unrealistic enough) to try dictating how the Ave Maria boards or, for that matter, Tom Monaghan, should dispose of assets legally or morally theirs. But being possessed of power never has been and never will be a sure protection against using one's assets in a way that harms others. Ave Maria leadership, having asked large numbers of professionals and their families to come to Michigan as part of a vibrant and successful complex of operations here, should have inquired diligently among those persons for their input on something as dramatic as the de facto destruction of almost everything they built here. The fundamental fact is that most people contributing to the Ave Maria mission were not consulted. That is a pity. Many intelligent voices could have been heard long ago and in less contentious ways. Moreover, the manner in which subordinate Ave Maria personnel (many of those still here, and even more of those already gone) have been informed of these changes has been far blunter than are any voices raised in opposition.

But before concluding, may I be permitted some more personal remarks regarding the advice I have been given toward acting with integrity?

I have acted with integrity in seeking employment elsewhere, but the very nature of academic work is that at least two years are needed to transition to an equivalent teaching position elsewhere. People who want to run a major academic institution should know that. They should also know that academics take ideas seriously and that the clash of important ideas and principles is not always neat. It is time for certain Ave Maria leadership to stop treating disagreement as disloyalty, and regarding academic protocol as a sort of arrogance.

But more fundamentally, as a married man with little kids, I simply can’t walk out on a job because I don’t like management’s decisions or manners. Unlike a religious who, whatever other sacrifices he makes, can fly home to room and board whenever he wants, or a retired successful attorney who can leave it all to relax on his ranch, my losing my job means monthly mortgages and utility bills start slipping. Credit cards are no substitute for paychecks.

Thus, even if my objections to Ave Maria leadership tactics were purely personal (and I trust that by now fair-minded readers can see that they clearly are not) I set that aside when I step into the classroom. I have fulfilled and will continue to fulfill completely the contract that I signed and to whose terms I consider myself bound: May I simply add that I am the most credentialed faculty member in the IPT, and one of the most that Ave Maria has on its distinguished roster; despite the gross upheaval in our personal lives, I regularly achieve the highest student ratings among a pool of very effective graduate teachers (and IPT students are not impressionable youths, but mid-life adults) and I stand with the best Ave Maria faculty in terms of publications and public profile. All of this, and much more, I placed at the disposal of Ave Maria. I was grateful to be here, and I thought they were happy to have me.

President Healy and Chancellor Fessio should not now try to shame me for my willingness to honor the contract all three of us signed.

4. Dr. Peters' Brief Reply to AMU Leadership Assertions

as reported in The Wanderer

By training and temperament, I want others to have a firm grasp on the facts about a situation before they draw conclusions or arrive at decisions thereon. That means I am strongly inclined to react to inaccuracies of which I am aware or to suggest alternative ways of viewing the same information where such alternatives are important to appreciate, but all this, I frankly submit, without imposing my views where I have no such authority (which is almost everywhere). At the same time, I am strongly disinclined to “serve as an advocate in my own defense” for much the same reasons that good lawyers avoid that role and those striving to be good Christians shun it.

Blessed and burdened as I am by these traits in tension, one can only imagine my reactions as I read the Statement of Ave Maria University Officials dated 14 June 2004, and some of the companion pieces, of which I became aware on June 25th. These official AMU statements are a mixture of factual inaccuracies and skewered interpretations such as one like me longs to engage but, because they contain so many very negative assertions about me, I am reluctant to combat for fear of committing greater wrongs along the way.

Moreover, I will not pretend that I was not saddened to see myself scored as “reprehensible” by anonymous authors writing in the name of an institution I used to admire. That these materials appeared in The Wanderer is a personal irony for me (although I believe its printing of the AMU statement was within the bounds of journalistic discretion) for I fondly recall writing dozens of articles and book reviews for The Wanderer some twenty or so years ago. Their solicitude then was much appreciated by a young man trying to hone his skills as a writer for Christian truth (not to mention by one for whom a $ 25 honorarium was a blessing!)

In any event, wisely or otherwise, in the face of most of the latest AMU leadership assertions about me and my writings, I now choose to remain mute. Eventually, one must let the truth speak for itself. The sole and very brief exception (even at that, not without several exceptions) I will allow myself will be for my IPT.

AMU leadership asserts in part (my numbering):

1. The Institute of Pastoral Theology was formerly the Institute for Religious and Pastoral Studies at the University of Dallas, and it was on the verge of being shut down or ‘mainstreamed’ when Fr. Fessio urged its director Doug Bushman to speak to Nick Healy, then President of AMC. The short story is that through Nick Healy’s efforts and the generosity of Mr. Monaghan, the IRPS, renamed IPT, was saved from real or virtual extinction, _ The Institute for Religious and Pastoral Studies is still at the University of Dallas, and I imagine it would object to any intimation to the contrary. The theological orientation of the IRPS greatly changed when Director Douglas Bushman, under pressure from a interim UD president desiring to change the IRPS, resigned, and with him, two of his associate directors. As individuals, (with me joining), we came to Ave Maria in Michigan to found the IPT. I concede Nick Healy made some “efforts” in this regard, but his "efforts" pale in comparison with the monumental efforts of Bushman, Twellman, Herrman, and Peters in relocating and establishing from scratch a graduate theological institute, let alone one with the unique characteristics of the IPT. It is disappointing to see, yet again, that only Healy and Monaghan are recognized as having done anything important for the IPT. Disappointing, but not surprising. Aside: Though I have often been perceived otherwise, I was not a regular faculty member of the IRPS in Dallas, I was an adjunct thereof, employed full-time in diocesan canonical work in California which I left to accept the full-time teaching offer from Ave Maria.

2. [the IPT] was supported for several years despite a cumulative deficit of several million dollars _ A deficit of "several million dollars"? This is an astounding claim which, if true, would rank the IPT among the most profligate programs in academe. Such a statement might tempt one to lash out in anger at the degree of distortion, or to sink in despair for the truth. Well, this shall be answered.

3. [IPT] is now thriving as part of AMU. _ The modifier “thriving” has been applied and challenged in several settings. So let’s be more descriptive, rather than evaluative: With extensive staff efforts and on a time-table much shorter (3 months instead of 14) than was discussed with us prior to coming to Ave Maria, the IPT launched its three-year cycle of classes [first at (basically) three sites, then] at six sites in the Midwest. At present, Level III students at six sites are entering their final year of course work. But, as a result of a string of decisions visited upon the IPT by Ave Maria leadership in the meantime, IPT Director Bushman has resigned, “Level II” [sic, I] classes will be continuing at only one site (Naples FL), and no “Level I” classes are scheduled to start at any other site this coming Fall. Having seen a “thriving” IPT, I simply would not use that term to describe it now.

4. There was turmoil. _  I agree, to put it mildly.

5. But it was unavoidable and entirely incident upon the actions required to save a fine program. _  "Unavoidable"? "Entirely incident upon required actions"? I disagree, to put it mildly.

6. It also has provided Dr. [Ed] Peters with continuous employment. _ Is this a reproach? Did I not provide Ave Maria with anything in return?

7. The consultation has been continuous. _ No. “Consultation” connotes serious inquiry with affected persons prior to making major decisions. I was unilaterally informed one day that the IPT had been transferred to one St. Mary’s College of Orchard Lake, and that I was a henceforth a faculty member of that institution. I didn't even know where SMC was. Months of post-decision attempts to discuss the problems this would engender, and trying efforts by IPT and SMC officials to accommodate the Ave Maria dictate, are not “consultation” in any meaningful sense of the term. Furthermore, hardly had this directive been achieved, than the IPT was again transferred to yet another institution, Madonna University. My experience of “consultation” this time around was “Here’s what Ave Maria is going to do next, and if you don’t like it, good luck somewhere else.” That was not a realistic alternative for people like me at the bottom of the Ave Maria chain of authority.

8. For Dr. Peters, whose livelihood has depended upon this commitment and these efforts, to use the IPT as the basis for his criticism is reprehensible. _ Employment at Ave Maria, at least in the context of those who express criticism of its goals and methods, is often described in terms suggesting “gift”, whence flows, as we have seen, Ave Maria criticism of such personnel for not being “grateful” for its largess. But as I have said before, an employee’s service is work, and “To one who works, his wages are not reckoned as a gift but as his due.” Rom 4:4. 

I know I am a sinner, but my actions at Ave Maria and my criticisms of its leadership have not been “reprehensible.” I have spoken accurately about the experience of the IPT; the authors of this Statement, whoever they are, have not.

+++

Post script: For something more like the truth about the crisis at Ave Maria than is available in the "Statement of Ave Maria University Officials," see Paul Likoudis, Thomas Monaghan pledges to close Ave Maria College in 2007.

5. AMC-Michigan Board Action, and Dr. Peters' Reaction

On 28 June 2004 (exactly one month after the Rose article appeared), the AMC-Michigan Board, lately supplied with a large amount of new information and alternative analyses of the overall situation, voted by apparently overwhelming majorities to approve a series of resolutions ratifying and implementing what it terms the "wind down" of Ave Maria College, in effect, making earlier actions that hitherto were only arguably attributable to it, their own.

I reproduce the Board's brief statement on this exactly as we received it:

I perceive in this statement no indication of Board interest in continuing the search for solutions to this crisis, but rather, an assertion of their willingness to accept whatever consequences, for good or for ill, will inevitably emerge. Subsequent to their statement, I sent the following brief and final message to members of the Ave Maria College Michigan Board.

Concluding Statement to the Esteemed

Members of the AMC-Michigan Board

May I begin by thanking you for your patience over the past month in accepting from me several unsolicited communications about the situation at AMC-Michigan. This will be my last such message to you, and I do not intend to offer any more replies to assertions made in other contexts concerning me or my positions. Cui bono?

I gather from the brief statement released in your name today that you have essentially ratified all of your previous actions in regard to AMC and that you are committed to the “wind down” of the College. I am deeply disappointed by this, but I feel, as I have always felt, that such a decision was, ultimately at least, within your prerogative.

As I hope you see by now, the purpose of my writing to you over the last month was to bring to your attention information and analysis indicating that as a group you were not in possession of sufficient facts at the times of your earlier actions, and/or that one member of your group was, directly or indirectly, exercising inordinate influence over you. The kinds of materials reaching you this month from a wide variety of sources, I thought, gave some basis for your taking these two concerns seriously and, at a minimum, suggested the prudence of your securing more time to assess them (for they are extensive) and allowing them to accumulate (for they are still coming to light). But that was only my opinion, and you have now clearly collectively decided otherwise.

By way of conclusion, though, may I briefly suggest two implications that I think arise from your actions today, one for you, one for me.

First, it seems that, after much additional data and alternative analyses were presented to you, you have, as I said, firmly expressed your willingness to stand by your actions in regard to AMC, come what may. Of course, how you implement a “wind down” will be one of the factors determining whether any defense of your decisions becomes necessary. Speaking only for myself, though, the cancellation of the “Madonna-takes-over-AMC” option obviates the cause of action I would have pursed in my name and my son’s. For that, I am relieved.

Second, as I suggested at the outset, there is no longer a constructive purpose to be served by my providing you with additional resources or different ways of viewing the facts. I devoted a considerable amount of time and talent to an effort I felt deserved it. As men and women of accomplishment yourselves, you will understand my obligation to shift my focus now to other projects that I hope will bear fruit. My assessment of the total situation at Ave Maria apparently differs dramatically from yours, but I know that, in the end, AMC is a responsibility that God has placed on your shoulders, not mine.

I am sure that we are already united in our prayers to do the will of the Father in all things, but today especially I pray for the community that came to know and build, depend on and love, Ave Maria College in Michigan.

Edward N. Peters, JD, JCD

28 June 2004

Post-Scripts

Our Sunday Visitor

featured 10 October 2004

Dear Editor:

May I offer a few correctives to Tom Tracy’s puff piece on Tom Monaghan (OSV 12 Sep 04)?

First, Ave Maria University and Ave Maria College are distinct institutions, and the latter is still very much located in Michigan, albeit struggling to survive after Monaghan’s surprise decision to shift his attention to a Florida venture, moving as much as quickly as he could from established Michigan operations to feed his latest plans. Second, the very impressive Ave Maria School of Law is also still in Michigan, directly and effectively confronting the sophisticated if secularized culture of the area.

More disturbingly, Tracy fails to probe the possibility that Monaghan’s well-known “damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead” mentality, one that served him well when he was being opposed by radical feminists and pro-abortion forces, might be seriously misplaced when the voices raised against his educational goals and methods are not only just as orthodox as he is, but might actually be more qualified than he is to direct credible Catholic academic institutions that aspire to greatness.

For Monaghan even to suggest, for example, that his accomplishments exceed those of Fr. Michael Scanlon (President, Franciscan University of Steubenville), or that the redoubtable Fr. Scanlon’s achievements represent the epitome of a century of American Catholic education, shows Monaghan to be a man with but a superficial grasp of academic life and history, and no little hubris.

I hope Monaghan will find time to read some of his own quotes carefully and then to ask himself seriously why so many decent and talented Catholics have come to feel trampled by his rush to do good however he defines it.

Dr. Edward Peters

Professor of Canon Law

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New Oxford Review

December 2004

Dear Editor:

Nicholas Healy’s defense of Ave Maria University (Oct) offers some reasons for what Tom Monaghan’s top people are doing to Ave Maria College (AMC), but it might also disclose some attitudes behind those actions. May I suggest an example?

In partial defense of moving Michigan operations to southern Florida, Healy writes “AMC was in cramped quarters in a somewhat run-down area of Ypsilanti.” How should the administrators of so many Catholic educational institutions that are making do with “cramped quarters” or that have stayed the course “in a somewhat run-down” neighborhood, read those words?

Is it wrong for a Christian institution to make a statement by remaining in a “somewhat run-down” area? Is Catholic or educational quality measured in zip codes? Adam Cardinal Maida has maintained his Sacred Heart Major Seminary in a section of Detroit that looks little better than a war zone, in part to witness to Christ’s unswerving commitment to the poor. Interestingly, some of Ave Maria’s brightest academic displaced persons (e.g., Dr. Janet Smith and Dr. John Hittinger) found faculty positions in Cdl. Maida’s seminary. Nor is the cardinal quixotic.

            I attended St. Louis University (SLU) in the 1970s. It was surrounded by the worst urban blight one could see anywhere, a bleakness that made modern Ypsilanti seem gentle by comparison. SLU has its deficiencies, but any fair-minded person must admit this: the Jesuits did not flee the desolation of the city, they transformed it. It has taken them 35 years, and they did it without a billionaire’s backing, but they resolutely reclaimed and revitalized a major community. And not a few residential blocks around a small campus, either, but a huge center-west swath of the City of St. Louis. When I read words like Healy’s, with his access to so much money, and facing far fewer urban decay problems, I wonder, what in the world he is complaining about?

As for AMC being “cramped”, that too depends on what you think a campus is for. If you see it as a setting, for example, for a 3,000 seat oratory--as planned for Ave Maria University (AMU) in Florida--then I must agree, AMC is too cramped. But if your goal is to establish an authentically Catholic, liberal arts college in a secularized area that desperately needs Christian witness, then AMC’s location is perfect. All the more so because little AMC lies literally across the street from a large (20,000--plus students) state university that has been quite accommodating to AMC’s requests to share sports and dining facilities, library privileges, and so on, enabling AMC to put more of its money into students instead of into braggadocian building schemes at AMU-FL touting the world’s-biggest-this and the world’s-biggest-that.

Finally, whatever disparaging things some might say about AMC’s campus, none of those would apply to the Ave Maria School of Law, which is possessed of spacious and modern facilities in Michigan (in the right zip code even!), and is, in short, a testament to what Monaghan’s money can accomplish. Yet even the law school has been pressured to uproot everything and start over from scratch in Florida’s wetlands! None of this makes any sense.

No one is asking Healy to return to AMC or live in Ypsilanti. To help promote Monaghan’s latest venture, Healy has moved to the resort city of Naples, Florida, and built a splendid home there. I rejoice for him. But I do not see how any of that justifies his use of AMC’s admirable willingness to continue serving “in cramped quarters in a somewhat run-down” area as one more reason to shut it down.

To the contrary, that’s one more reason to keep it open.

Dr. Edward Peters

Institute for Pastoral Theology (AMU)

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