The wheels are turning at Wheeling Jesuit:

WHEELING, W.Va. (AP) – At least 35 candidates are interested in becoming the next president of Wheeling Jesuit University, and seven have made the first cut.

Three will remain after interviews Monday and Tuesday, Oct. 12–13 in the search for a replacement for Rev. Julio Giulietti, S.J., who was fired after two years, as explained and discussed here and here and here. 

Later: I wondered why this was in the AP story, clearly just passing on what the U. said:

Many [of the candidates] have either been educated in or worked in Jesuit institutions and some alumni are among the contenders.

So what?  Ah, but as the anonymous commenter says below, no Jesuits applied! 

For the first time in [WJU’s] history, not a Jesuit [was] among them.

So the U. had to emphasize the Jesuit-ness of applicants.  Hmmm.

Read this story at Chicago Catholic News that adds to what I have below, such as that the chancellor of the archdiocese is an Ascension parishioner.  He is Jimmy Lago, a former Democratic precinct captain and later lobbyist in Springfield for the archdiocese, who was cited by the St. Edmund pro-life chairman, Susan Jordan, in her complaint to the archdiocese.

“I would have thought someone as high ranking as the chancellor would have gone to the pastor and said, ‘You need to change this,’ but that didn’t happen,” apparently until the very last minute, said Jordan . . . who singled out Lago in her complaint.

Lago defended himself to ChicagoCatholicNews:

“I had nothing to do with the . . . forum. (When I became aware of it) I insisted it be non-partisan, if held; meaning no candidates for office and emphasis was to be given to the [U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’] position on healthcare reform.”

As it was, the event turned out to be “a political event masquerading as a forum,” Jordan told CCN.  She said she “had pro-life friends who were told their questions would not be submitted” to the panel. 

But the pastor, Fr. Larry McNally, was very pleased with the event, he told Wednesday Journal.

“I would do it over again . . .   I thought it was very fair. I didn’t feel we were promoting anything other than answering questions from folks.  I thought it was very good.  I really did.  I thought, boy, this turned out to be terrific.  It was just an emotional two hours.  It was a very positive experience.” 

Danny Davis, as mentioned below, was told by McNally as he arrived that he could not speak.  Those who know of Davis simply not showing up where he’s expected — a few weeks ago at a Saturday morning pro-ObamaCare event at a Maywood church, for one — might consider it poetic justice. 

In any case, he appeared “upset by the decision to bar him from talking,” according to descriptions by “more than one person at the event,” said CCN.  Later, however, he told CCN he was “totally fine with it . . .”

If you haven’t gone to mass or service or Unitarian discussion group yet or if you have gone already or don’t intend to go, here’s something to mull.

Provocative opening shots:

* “In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move.” — Douglas Adams (1952-2001)

* “Any one thing in the creation is sufficient to demonstrate a Providence to an humble and grateful mind.” — Epictetus (55 – 135)

About Aristotle:

* “It is with a certain awe,” says William E. Carroll (“Aquinas and the Big Bang,” First Things, November 1999), “we read that magnificent chapter in [Aristotle’s] Metaphysics in which he demonstrates the existence of a Prime Mover and First Principle of all things. That a pagan philosopher, by the unaided light of reason, should acquire so clear a conception of the Godhead in Its unity and simplicity, is marvellous.

…………………….

“[I]n a chapter only less sublime than that we have been contemplating, he clearly asserts the unity and simplicity of God: “The Prime Mover is indivisible; is without parts; and has absolutely no kind of magnitude”{Physics, VIII. xv. § 26}.

. . . . What Aristotle fails to see is the nature and operation of God as Cause. He fails to see that the highest act of causality is creation. He fails to see how the preservative act is a continuation of the causative act.

Creation didn’t happen just once, it keeps happening.

About Aquinas:

* In the thirteenth century . . . scholars such as Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas wrestled with the implications for Christian theology of the most advanced science of their day — namely, the works of Aristotle and his Muslim commentators, which had recently been translated into Latin.

Following in the tradition of Muslim and Jewish thinkers, Aquinas developed an analysis of the doctrine of creation ex nihilo [from nothing] that remains one of the enduring accomplishments of Western culture. His analysis provides refreshing clarity for our often confused contemporary discussion of the relationship between science and religion.

Then Chesterton, from Orthodoxy:

* My own positive conviction that personal creation is more conceivable than material fate, is, I admit, in a sense, undiscussable. I will not call it a faith or an intuition, for those words are mixed up with mere emotion, it is strictly an intellectual conviction; but it is a PRIMARY intellectual conviction like the certainty of self of the good of living.

A first principle, we might say. Which is hard to argue with, yes. And one man’s insight is another raw impulse. On the other hand . . .

Rev. Edward Glynn SJ, the Rev. Julio Giulietti’s only Jesuit friend in maybe the whole wide world (at least his sole supporter among four Wheeling Jesuit U. trustees) has provided a paper trail that helps to unravel the mysterious story of how and why Giulietti was ousted as WJU president.

An email trail, that is — our age’s inexorable friend of tell-all revelation and foe of apocalyptic meandering — posted at the “Save! Wheeling Jesuit University” blog. Glynn, also a WJU director, wrote on Aug. 1 to the 19 directors, excusing himself from a “special meeting” set for Aug. 5.  His brother was dying, and he would be attending wake, mass, and burial back in Clark’s Summit PA.

He had been “looking eagerly forward to participate”; so he filled the directors in on his thinking.  This included his July 13 email to board chair Bill Fisher (who doubles as financial officer for the Wheeling diocese, a position directly responsible to the bishop) asking

“what else is on the agenda for the special August meeting.  If it is only the assessment of the president, how can we do an accurate assessment and one helpful to the institution if we don’t have input from the faculty, administration, staff, students and alumni/ae?”

The fat was in the fire for Giulietti, and Glynn was prodding.

Fisher got back the same day: Nothing else was scheduled.  His language was typical email shorthand and mysterious:

“ This is the only agenda item. I copy Mr. [Tom] Scheye [not the lawyer, as earlier stated, but facilitator (consultant) as elsewhere designated] as he is contracted to [sic] all of what you mentioned , the time table I am not sure.”

Pronto, Glynn to Scheye, seeking wisdom in the matter:

“Bill without answering my question sent you a copy of my question to him. Do you have an answer to my question?”

Fisher explained further:

“I was hoping Tom Scheye would answer your question. We are going to discuss what is complete at that time.”

So.  Scheye is working on it, namely how the directors can assess Giulietti without anything to go on from the university community.

Scheye got back the next day in workmanlike fashion:

My assessment will not be complete until I have had the chance to interview members of the faculty, staff and student body, and those interviews will wait for the beginning of the new semester. However, I wil l send the Directors an edited version of their own comments in time for the August meeting, and I have suggested to Julio that he complete his self-assessment so that might be available to provide context for the Directors’ comments. In short, the Directors will not have my assessment in August, but they will be able to see what their fellow Directors’ comments are. Hope that helps.

As emails go, this is brilliant.  And in fact, revealing.  He would be advising the directors about what they were on record as saying and was waiting to hear from “Julio.”  His own assessment (does he mean his summary? he is to assess the president?) would not be ready for the coming meeting, however.

Glynn, unsatisfied, got back to Fisher:

I still have my question. Why are we having a special board meeting that has only one agenda item and this agenda item will only be half prepared? It seems weird to me.

Two days later, having heard nothing, he asked again.  Re-sent the email.  I have done that.  You jog memory or conscience of intended recipient.  Bill responded.  My way or the highway, he said:

Serious decisions need to be made about the direction of the University. You will receive a packet of information that might clarify things.

I exercise my right as Board Chair t o call the meeting a majority of the board has told me they want one.

If you feel strongly it is a waste of time, you may ask to be excused.

Stay with your dead brother and stop bothering me.

The response tore it for Glynn.  Commenting to the board on Aug. 1:

I judge Bill’s sending out a second set of directors’ comments indicating in red and blue unfavorable and favorable comments respectively to be highly manipulative and insulting. Each director can read and can make his or her own interpretation. We do not need the chair to do each director’s interpretation. Otherwise WJU might as well have a board of one director.

Furthermore, as to [not Scheye’s assessment, etc., but the unnamed lawyer’s role]:

Since this was supposed to be the evaluation of the directors I find the lengthy comments of the university’s lawyer to be very inappropriate. Legal counsel is not a member of board of directors.

Glynn had already voiced his opinion of [not Scheye, but the lawyer].

If I were the WJU president, I could never in the future trust the board’s legal counsel personally nor professionally. His phone call to the administrative assistant to the president to ask her whether in his phone call with the president that had just concluded there had been anyone else in the president’s office was politically crude and personally dumb.

This was not Glynn’s first turn around the block, he explains:

During the last four decades at a dozen and a half institutions of higher education located all over the United States [among them John Carroll U., Cleveland OH, where he was president from the midddle or late ‘90s to 2005] I have been working as a faculty member and administrator or serving on their boards. All these institutions are larger and more complicated than Wheeling Jesuit University. During these nearly forty years I have not experienced such a similarly inappropriate presidential evaluation and calling of a special board meeting to consider the half completed presidential evaluation.

As for the coming meeting:

This special board meeting that is being called to consider the not yet completed evaluation of the president (Only the directors’ evaluations have been received and none from other major constituents of the university, such as students, faculty members, administration, staff and alumni/ae.) is a continuation and an institutionalization of the dysfunctionality of the WJU board of directors and is a grave disservice to Wheeling Jesuit University by the board of directors.

Meanwhile, the chairman of the trustees, Rev. Gerard Stockhausen, S.J., Ph.D., President, University of Detroit Mercy, on July 25 informed his fellow (Jesuit) trustees that he was

calling a special meeting of the WJU Board of Trustees by conference call at 1:45 PM EDT on August 5. The only agenda item will be to discuss any action(s) taken by the Board of Directors at its August 5 meeting, and to take whatever action the Board of Trustees needs to as a result of action(s) taken by the Board of Directors.

As a result?  Such as unfavorable evaluation?  They were to endorse or not endorse it?  As it happened, the directors on Aug. 5 failed to register a 2/3 majority in favor of ousting Giulietti, which dictated the action to be taken.  It was to oust Giulietti themselves, by a 3–0 vote, Glynn and Giulietti being absent.  This they did.

Fr. Shanley of Boston is challenging repressed memories in the Mass. Supreme Court.

Shanley is challenging his conviction based on an ongoing debate in the psychiatric community over the validity and reliability of repressed memories. The highest court in Massachusetts will hear Shanley’s appeal Thursday.

This is a very big deal, gets to the heart of many a case against the allegedly abuser priest.

Nearly 100 scientists, psychiatrists and researchers have signed a friend-of-the court brief denouncing the theory of repressed-recovered memories. Another group has submitted a brief supporting the theory.

His lawyer says he was convicted on

“junk science” testimony about repressed memories by prosecution witnesses.

It worked this way, he said:

“They needed repressed memories to normalize for the jury what was otherwise an extraordinary assertion — that he could be completely oblivious that this ever happened and then remember it 20 years later.”

Huge money settlements have been made to Shanley’s victims.  His case led to the departure of Cardinal Bernard Law from Boston.

Do you like a mystery?  Do you love a mystery?  If so, you have to love the slowly unfolding Wheeling Jesuit story. 

The heart of the matter is why Rev. Julio Giulietti SJ was abruptly fired as president of Wheeling Jesuit University.  Inside Higher Education has more than anyone else on the matter:

Did the bishop do it?

The perceived rush to judgment has led to speculation that the local Roman Catholic bishop, the Most Rev. Michael J. Bransfield, a longtime donor with no jurisdiction over the university, pushed for the ouster. A spokesman for the diocese denied the bishop’s involvement, but DiTrapano and another board member have heard otherwise.

“I believe that this termination was directly ordered by the diocese,” said Lynda Wolford, a director who resigned over the issue.

Wolford said she was told by someone “close to the diocese” that the bishop ordered the termination, but she would not elaborate on the source.

Did he have motive?

Despite denials from the diocese, many believe the bishop was interested in obtaining a valuable piece of property that Father Giuletti appeared best positioned to acquire. The property in question was Mount de Chantel [sic: it’s Chantal] Visitation Academy, a recently closed school that is still home to five nuns. The nuns had an affection for Father Giulietti and the university, which is located on contiguous property, and had hoped Wheeling Jesuit would purchase and renovate the buildings – providing a home for the sisters for the remainder of their lives.

While the university may not have been financially positioned to acquire the property, Father Giulietti’s favored access was a source of frustration, according to Wolford’s unnamed source.

Did he have means?

[William] Fisher, the Board of Directors chair who initiated the vote, works for the bishop as the diocese’s financial officer.

Did the Jesuits do it?  Well, three of them who are trustees were the proximate cause, no doubt of that.  The two other trustees, also Jesuits, were missing when they voted to get rid of one of them, Giulietti, in the absence of his sole supporter among them, Rev. Edward Glynn SJ, who was away at a family funeral.

These are the three:

Rev. Brian O’Donnell, the Jesuit community rector for Wheeling; the Rev. Gerard Stockhausen, president of the University of Detroit Mercy; and the Rev. Thomas F. Gleeson, a former president of the Jesuit School of Theology in Berkeley, Calif.

Gleeson unfortunately has a blot on his escutcheon, having been named

as a defendant in a highly publicized sexual harassment suit filed by a former male student in Berkeley. The suit, which alleged Gleeson had asked to masturbate with the young seminary student, settled out of court in 2000 with no admission of wrongdoing . . .

The three acted after the much bigger board of directors came just short of the 2/3 majority needed to fire Giulietti.  The trustees had apparently been quiescent, to go by Rudolph DiTrapano, a Charleston, WV, lawyer and member of the board.

“[Giulietti] survived the Board of Directors, then to add insult to injury some Board of Trustees I’d never heard of, three out of five show up, and overrule us,” DiTrapano said.

“I have not heard of any activity that the Board of Trustees embarked on [before this vote],” he adds. “It’s just bizarre that we were required to vote if our vote was meaningless.”

That is, Guilietti’s fate was sealed, in his view.  It’s still a mystery, but the Inside Higher Ed reporter, Jack Stripling, has done much to make it less mysterious.

Search team in place for successor to fired Wheeling Jesuit U. president.

Board of Directors Chairman Bill Fisher says two employees, one student and one community representative will help five board members choose candidates to replace Julio Giulietti.

Otherwise, mum’s the word:

Fisher said Monday he’s still not at liberty to discuss the nature of the board’s concerns. But he says Giulietti is to return to New England for consultation about a new ministry and assignment.

The directors have endorsed the all-Jesuit trustees’ decision to oust Giuletti, having earlier not ousted him for lack of a 2/3 vote to do so.

Not surprisingly, the Maryland Province provincial also endorsed it.  West Va. is in that province.  And the New England provincial, Giuletti’s superior, “has asked Giulietti to return to New England for discernment regarding a new ministry and assignment,” according to the [Charleston] State Journal.

This man is Myles Sheehan, S.J., M.D., who was based at Loyola Hospital and was Cardinal Francis George’s physician until his recent appointment as provincial.

Meanwhile, two directors had resigned as of 8/28,

Lynda C. Wolford, C.P.A., Director of Internal Audit and Management Analysis at Georgetown University for 12 yrs, and Rudolph L. DiTrapano, Esq., one of the very few lawyers listed in The Best Lawyers of America,

according to the “Save! Wheeling Jesuit University” website created to protest Giulietti’s firing.

Also, a students’ FaceBook group has been formed in his support.