Burke-Sullivan, Eileen C.

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Conversations on Jesuit Higher EducationVolume 51 Article 162-1-2017Urgent Values: Sustaining a Very Fine BalanceEileen C. Burke-SullivanFollow this and additional works at: http://epublications.marquette.edu/conversationsRecommended CitationBurke-Sullivan, Eileen C. (2017) "Urgent Values: Sustaining a Very Fine Balance," Conversations on Jesuit Higher Education: Vol. 51 ,Article 16.Available at: http://epublications.marquette.edu/conversations/vol51/iss1/1630 CONVERSATIONS ON JESUIT HIGHER EDUCATION                                                                                                                                          A few weeks after I became the Mission Officer forCreighton University, a group of young women un-dergraduates asked for an appointment. At issue wastheir common hope that they could be given academiccredit for internships served in marketing efforts foran area abortion clinic. Their argument was that as aJesuit, Catholic university we did not live up to thedescription of the value of care for the whole person(cura personalis) by denying them this opportunity forbecoming professionals in the business of marketing.         Only weeks later, the chancery called to expressdismay that the university was sponsoring an inter-national speaker who has spent his entire life battlingthe disease of AIDS in Africa. The challenge arose be-cause the speaker had strongly endorsed the necessityfor the use of condoms to slow the disease’s infectionsamong young mothers and their infant children.         On the same day that the chancery officer called,a large student and faculty group was planning for a“Black Lives Matter” prayer and solidarity event atthe fountain on the plaza in front of St. John’s Church.Hundreds participated, while a small fringe groupprotested that we were supporting violence.        Ironically and sadly, within a few more weeks wewere carrying the body of a local police officer acrossthe same plaza space toward her funeral Mass. Theofficer was shot to death by a gang member justblocks from campus.        In every one of these instances and many, manymore with similar resonances, there were rancorousconversations about whether we should be doing andsaying what the university was doing and saying.Many of these conversations arose within the univer-sity community and many arose from those on theoutside judging whether this institution lives up to itsself-stated mission, either as Catholic or as a university.       As a representative for the Catholic, Jesuit char-acter of the mission of higher education in many ofthese conversations, I have found that it is urgent tostay faithful to at least six basic Catholic and Ignatianvalues and behaviors that speak to practicing whatwe preach:  • Only in God is all truth found. No person or in-stitution, embedded in the limitations of histori-cal finitude, is capable of naming all truth aboutany person, discipline, principle, idea, or othercreated reality, much less about God.  • What truth we can know is best discovered in dia-logue with persons we don’t necessarily agreewith, persons who have had very differentlife/cultural experiences than we have, and per-sons who have an investment in a specific issuethat I might not have. Persons of color in theUnited States have much different experiences ofacceptability than do white persons. Men have todialogue with women. Straight and LGBTQ per-sons have to attend to each other, as do old andyoung, those with disabilities and those with noevident disability. No person of privilege under-stands oppression unless they share in the experi-ence by what Fr. Gregory Boyle, S.J., calls“kinship” with the oppressed. Material wealth,the accident of skin color, educational level, andgender all establish privilege in various cultures.   • Truth and facticity are not the same. Genuinetruth can be known only in the context of love.To speak (or shout, or snarl) “truth” hatefully orwith indifference to another may have somecontent facticity, but it is not truth and is oftennot helpful for the university engaged in thepursuit of truth.Urgent ValuesSustaining a Very Fine BalanceBy Eileen C. Burke-Sullivan1Burke-Sullivan: Urgent Values: Sustaining a Very Fine BalancePublished by e-Publications@Marquette, 2017                                                                                                                                                                                                               31  • Ignatius posited that in order to eventually ar-rive at common understanding of the truth wemust first interpret what the other is saying inthe best light possible. This is not Pollyannaish.It is rather the principle of attempting to hearbeyond our own biases to the possibility of agreater truth we have never allowed ourselvesto consider.  • While words are very important, sometimeswords are so limited they prevent us fromreaching mutual respect. In such case, silence –especially the silence of attentive consideration– or beauty or humor may lift us beyond thelimitedness of the words.  • Difficult conversations are most productive (thatis, bring about positive human relationships andmutual enlightenment) when they are carried onrespectfully, reflectively, and with an ear to dis-cerning the Spirit of God or spirits of the dark at work.        I draw this last point from the work of sharing theSpiritual Exercises. An effective guide (or conversa-tionalist) has minimally opened his heart to under-standing and recognizing the spirits that often affecthim while he is in a difficult conversation. A guidewho is more effective listens with a heart available notonly to her own spirits but at the same time to thosemoving the other. St. Peter Faber spoke about the darkspirit within himself being attracted to action by thedark spirit in the other – and these spirits collude todestroy the possibility of discovering what it is thatGod would have us know. It is easy in highly con-tentious situations to feel defensive. Knowing intu-itively that the best defense is a good offense, we riskattacking the other when our own real desire wouldbe to listen attentively and without defensiveness.        Sometimes it is obvious ahead of time that a con-versation is going to be difficult. Difficult perhaps be-cause it is fraught with probable disagreement,tension, insecurity, new and dangerous information,or challenge (especially challenge to the status quoand its comfortable stability). Or difficult because weidentify or challenge others’ fears, limits, hopes, or ex-pectations. In either case I find it crucial to preparewith prayer and every effort to stay attentive to thecontent of the conversation along with my own affec-tive and intellective responses to it. Further, it is im-portant to provide time and space to attend to theothers in the conversation.         All too often, however, ordinary meetings or con-versations turn “difficult” without warning. For ad-ministrators at a Jesuit university this suggests thatopenness to God’s activities in our hearts as well asawareness of our limited human abilities recom-mends that we develop habits of reflectivity and gra-ciousness. A daily practice of the Ignatian examen ofconsciousness becomes the most effective tool whichsupports those habits.       The Catholic and Jesuit character of the mission ofhigher education is ill served if it is described or appliedin “one-size-fits-all” terms. Frequent oversimplificationof complex principles to banner or bumper-stickervalue slogans, while useful in one-hour orientation ses-sions, are not ultimately helpful in making clear thevery complex challenges of living toward the reign ofGod on earth, especially in a broader culture of increas-ingly insistent, secular fundamentalism.         Universities assert that they must be absolutepractitioners of “academic freedom,” and none of usin the academy can eschew that fundamental value.In light of our Catholic, Jesuit heritage, however, wecan require more clarity about what is meant by free-dom, and whose freedom we are protecting. If theuniversity’s ultimate purpose is the pursuit of truth,then academic freedom must serve that truth – in thebreadth and depth of the search, in the dynamic ofdisclosure, and in reflection on the consequences ofits exercise.         Finally, it is important to state that difficult con-versations, even well conducted with all the grace thatGod sends, will not necessarily bring agreement ofpurpose or practice. Living with polarities is the es-sential character of Christianity. All Christian doctrineis a series of ideas in tension – insisting on theboth/and rather than the either/or. In practice wecan’t always do both/and, but it is worth pursuingthe possibilities and finding the ground of – at least –mutual respect.Eileen C. Burke-Sullivan is Vice Provost for Mission andMinistry at Creighton University.2Conversations on Jesuit Higher Education, Vol. 51, Iss. 1 [2017], Art. 16http://epublications.marquette.edu/conversations/vol51/iss1/16

Urgent Values: Sustaining a Very Fine Balance

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Urgent Values: Sustaining a Very Fine Balance

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