College Journalists Apologize For Expressing Free Speech, Saying Catholic Church Wants To Prevent AIDS

The student journalists at The Hawk are in trouble! In last week’s issue, the paper published its annual joke issue, The Squawk, which got them in a bit of hot water. And now, forced with an army of angry Jesuits, the paper has apologized for the joke issue. And university spokeswoman Harriet Goodheart told the Inquirer she couldnt’ say whether the students would be punished. (Sigh.)

Among the content people were offended: the president of St. Joe’s, the Rev. Timothy Lannon, endorsing condom use; an article saying the only St. Joe’s women’s basketball fan had been murdered; an article describing Cardinal Rigali as gay; and, of course, the comparison of Jesuits to Nazis.

That last one, obviously, is ridiculous. Everyone knows Jesuits are way more totalitarian than Nazis. But the paper’s Editor-in-Chief posted an apology to the St. Joe’s community, which prompted a commenter to respond with this: “This isn’t MadTV, folks. I hope everyone associated with this debacle learned something.” That’s right; Even if it was offensive, The Squawk might have actually made people laugh.

But the letters to the editor in this week’s Hawk shed some more light on the situation. Four seniors wrote an up-in-arms letter saying, “Plainly, it is inappropriate to attach the President’s name and photo to a condom ad.” Hey, that works for the president of St. Joe’s or of the United States!

The letter also revealed a few days ago someone (presumably from St. Joe’s) dumped a case of beer on Cardinal Rigali’s lawn. No word if the archbishop is a Natty Ice fan.

But the best letter comes from — who else — Tom Brennan, a Jesuit priest and English teacher, who proves that, well, maybe Jesuits aren’t much like Nazis after all:

Thank you for publishing last week’s Squawk. I laughed my head off at it. Of course, I imagine that some did not, but perhaps Geoffrey Chaucer’s lines from the “Prologue to The Miller’s Tale” are worth repeating: “And eek men shall nat make ernest of game” (l.78). (We teach Chaucer, by the way, in Texts and Contexts - one of our very canonical selections for that course.)

Preach on, father. And eek men shall not make ernest of game indeed.

College journalists apologize for satire [Inquirer]
St. Joe’s Apologizes for April Fool’s Parody [KYW 1060]
The Hawk apologizes for squawk content [The Hawk]
Letter: Squawk succeeds in amusing [The Hawk]
Letter: Parody paper not amusing [The Hawk]

On The Whole, The Maryland Jesuits Would Rather Have Accused Priest In Philadelphia

What did the Jesuits do in the early 1990s when priests were accused of, ah, sexual misconduct?

Why, our fair priestly men sent at least one to be the basketball team chaplain at Saint Joseph’s! Although a spokeswoman for the Maryland Jesuits said the allegations didn’t include contact but “asking someone to do something that makes them uncomfortable,” the Rev. H. Cornell Bradley was removed from the ministry. The new allegations come from the 1970s.

When he faced similar allegations in the 1990s, Bradley was shipped to Philadelphia.

Bradley, 69, faced other allegations in the early 1990s and was sent to residential psychiatric treatment for several months in 1993, according to the province. Health care workers deemed him fit for ministry, Pipkin said, and he was sent to Philadelphia’s St. Joseph’s University in 1995, where he stayed for a decade as campus minister and basketball team chaplain, among other positions.

That decision was a mistake, the province said in a letter sent last week to Gonzaga alumni and others Bradley worked with as a priest. The one credible substantiated allegation against him at the time — of having “a long-term, abusive sexual relationship with an adult woman,” Pipkin said — under today’s policies would have been sufficient to remove him from ministry.

Ahh, so now you won’t be able to separate “St. Joe’s basketball” and “disgraced priest” in your mind. Is this an NCAA violation, by the way?

Ex-Student Accuses Jesuit Of Misconduct [Washington Post]
Former St. Joe’s priest is focus of sex allegations [Inquirer]

Reason #50 To Love Philadelphia: The Big 5

Last night was the Holy War, the annual basketball contest between St. Joe’s and Villanova that uses the slaughter of innocents in the name of God as a nickname. But, anyway, it’s usually a game with a decent amount of buildup; the fans are always into it; the two teams sometimes even play a good game.

Last night, though, I watched the entire thing even though it was a terrible game. ‘Nova won, 56-39. But that only scratches it: the two teams combined to shoot 6-for-36 from three-point range, meaning around 30 trips down the court included a long shot that clanked or airballed. (Threes are almost a mid-range jumper in college.)

But, still, the game was exciting and fun to watch. So huzzah for college basketball in Philly, which makes 16 percent three-point shooting somewhat watchable.

Cats romp as Hawks go ice-cold [Inquirer]

St. Jameer University

The Daily News reports today on a mini-crime spree at St. Joe’s, with an robbery at an Aramark office on campus and, more seriously, the shooting of a student and his friend.

But look and see who the school spokesman is:

“What’s happening all over the city seems to be creeping in our direction. We’re looking for the same thing that every neighborhood in crisis asks for, which is a greater police presence. All the security cameras, swipe-card readers and other technology in the world is not as effective as a visible security presence.” — JOSEPH LUNARDI, school spokesman

That’d be none other than Joe Lunardi, Bracketologist. Only at St. Joe’s could the guy who is famous for coming up with the NCAA Tournament bracket throughout the year be the school spokesman. Awesome.

Hawk Hill crime eyed [Daily News]

Hoops Quickies: Wrong Chaney retires

There’s lots of basketball news today, so I’m just going to throw them all together into one post (you can skip it if you’re not interested!):

• In the biggest-yet-not-surprising news of the day, Temple coach John Chaney is retiring. Chaney is a well-respected coach and person, but he also has done such fun things as threaten to kill another coach, and send in a “goon” for hard fouls — culminating with a St. Joe’s player breaking his arm. So, uhh, we should all be sorry to see him go. [6 ABC]

• In teams that made the tournament, Main liners Villanova got a No. 1 seed and will play the winner of the play-in game. The Wildcats will also play their first two games at the Wachovia Center. Ivy Leaguers Penn got a No. 15 seed. Penn will play Texas in Dallas, which means Penn won’t have a second game. [Inky]

• Chaney’s farewell tour will take place starting on Tuesday, as the Owls play a home game on Tuesday against noted hoops power Akron. St. Joe’s gets a first-round bye, while La Salle was left out. [AP/Philly.com]

• The 76ers won yesterday — over Memphis! — but Allen Iverson got hurt in the first half. Cue 10,000 callers to sports talk radio saying the Sixers are better without A.I. [Daily News]

College kids are rude? Well I never!

There’s a big giant story in today’s Daily News by two writers I really like and respect (that’d be Dick Jerardi and Dana O’Neil) about the acrimony between St. Joe’s and Villanova basketball fans and how “bad” it’s gotten in recent years. Last night some SJU kids invaded Jay Wright’s radio show.

So, apparently, now the rollouts are meaner, the fans are obscene and some people yelled something nasty at Villanova coach Jay Wright’s wife. Of course, “It’s never people directly attacking her,” Wright says. And now fans deride the opponent rather than cheer on their school.

And then, there’s this:

Last summer, former St. Joe’s superstar Jameer Nelson worked tirelessly with Villanova sophomore Kyle Lowry at the Wildcats’ gym. More than once, Nelson had to go on the campus and rouse Lowry out of bed. Every time he did he got the look.

“Lots of people saw me on campus,” Nelson said. “They looked at me like, ‘What are you doing here?’ I’m helping one of their guys out, that’s what I was doing.”

Yes, and NBA superstar is on a campus of a school he never went to and people are like What are you doing here? How dare they question the great Jameer!

In my other life, I cover Ivy League basketball for a website. (I know. Who knew?) And so I’m at a lot of games, albeit most of them without any players on scholarship. And fans now in general seem to be ruder. This used to bother me. Now I don’t really care. While St. Joe’s-Nova is a very good, fun rivalry — the “Holy War,” natch — the students at these games aren’t meaner to the opposing team than they are to other schools.

Or not. The “rollouts are worse” sentiment seems to be pretty silly since the most infamous rollout of all time, “What’s the Difference between Chris Ford and a dead baby? A dead baby doesn’t suck.” was a long time ago. Ditto the “HA HA HA FUCK YOU” one at a Penn game in ‘82. Or, that sign at the Spectrum, “Patrick Ewing can’t read this.”

But, then again, wondering why Jameer was in a place he was at? How dare you, Villanova fans.

The Dogs of War [DN]
Of Biblical Proportions [Snowballs for Santa]