Thursday, April 23, 2009

Is The (Jesuit) University of San Francisco a Catholic University?

Not according to the Faculty Association President.

Valerie Schmalz over at Our Sunday Visitor has the latest news on USF's paying for abortions. On December 12, 2008, she reported that USF's Health Plan covered abortions for students, then on March 20, 2009, she reported the good news that the University had dropped any that coverage.

But at that time she also reported:

"A separate problem reported by OSV was that the university's two health insurance plans for employees provided abortion coverage. The USF administration says it can't do anything about a Kaiser health plan for faculty that offers abortion because it is included in a contract that was extended for three years in November. But it has changed its Blue Cross coverage, effective March 1, and has notified faculty that Blue Cross will no longer cover abortion in any form, including the drug RU486."

From Ms. Schmalz's article of today:

"If you work for the Jesuit University of San Francisco, no matter which USF health insurance you choose, it will pay for an abortion, sterilization, artificial contraception and some infertility treatments. And that is unlikely to change anytime soon, despite a report here earlier this year.

The USF Faculty Association president, Elliot Neaman, said today that if the university tries to remove the abortion benefit, it would file an unfair labor practice complaint.

Whether abortion involves the killing of a child is “not relevant,” Neaman told OSV. “You are mixing up morality and contractual obligations,” he said...

Neaman said the Catholic Church’s opposition to abortion is irrelevant, Neaman said, because USF is not legally a Catholic university. 'A long time ago, to get federal funding, the Jesuits divested themselves of the university so it is basically run by the board of trustees. They cannot apply for an exemption as a Catholic university because they could lose federal funding because of that,' he said."

Heaven forbid USF should lose federal funding!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

That's a relief! Hey USF, go crazy! You don't even have to pretend to hold yourself to a higher standard any longer. Now you're just a more expensive alternative to SF State. In light of that, who cares what they do? I know St. Ignatius church isn't 'technically' on the grounds of the school, so really all the pretense of Catholicism is nothing but camp and parody. I'm so glad I'm finally in on the joke!

Anonymous said...

I'm comforted to know that USF is as Catholic as you are. You're not "legally" Catholic either.

Anonymous said...

Why restrict the question to just USF? Better question: Are there any Catholic Universities/Colleges in the S.F. Bay area? The only school that comes to mind is the Dominican School at GTU. -gravey