The Church has extended a remarkable honour to one of our contemporary treasures, and I couldn't be happier in the choice. On the occasion of her 90th birthday, Dr Alice von Hildebrand was invested as a Dame Grand Cross of the Pontifical Order of St. Gregory the Great, which would have a tremendous meaning for one who was devoted to both Pope Saint Gregory and the Benedictine tradition.
Cardinal Burke, prefect of the Vatican Signatura – the highest judicial body in the Church – said in a keynote address that both Dietrich von Hildebrand, a professor at Fordham University, and his wife, who taught philosophy for 37 years at Hunter College in NY, faithfully carried out the role of Catholic educators in engendering in students the “listening heart” that leads one to the fullness of truth in the Catholic faith.
“So often today, we find individual Catholics as well as Catholic endeavors and institutions in the state of some confusion or even error about their Catholic identity,” he said. “In particular, a notion of tolerance of ways of thinking and acting contrary to Catholic teaching and morals seemingly has become the interpretative key of many of our Catholic activities. This notion is not securely grounded in the moral tradition, but it tends to dominate our approach to the extent that we end up claiming to be Catholic while tolerating ways of thinking and acting which are diametrically opposed to the moral law and therefore to the Catholic faith.”
Imagine her tenacity in not compromising her faith even in such a secular setting, with its pressures and constraints!
The cardinal said that Alice von Hildebrand “tirelessly gives witness to the truth of the faith through the witness of her life and through her speaking and writing. … So many students were drawn to Christ and assisted in receiving faith in him who alone is our salvation. She truly loved her students, and therefore wanted them to know the truth and its living source in God.”
Alice von Hildebrand has said that she never sought to proselytize her students, but that simply teaching that there is an objective truth that can be known led many to the Catholic faith.“There’s a whole passel of former students who are her godchildren, and for every one of them dozens of others, if not hundreds who owed so much to her intellectually and spiritually,” Block continued. “Her wit and generosity were the sugar that made the medicine go down. The medicine was the truth, the salubrious truth that was her gift to us in a world that was so stingy about it.”
Consider the spiritual motherhood at work in that very classroom, and how her active and listening heart won over so many souls to the truth. Truth and beauty speak a language of dignity and consistency, which must have been present even in the indifferent halls of Hunter College. Her integrity of character is tremendously inspiring, showing us that there is no setting where maternal wisdom cannot shine.
While Pope Francis seems to think that we need a new "theology of women," it seems that the theology surrounding the truth of God is sufficient to form young men and women--even today. Dame Alice always sensed that, and used her classroom as a "seat of wisdom." Hearty congratulations to this fine woman!
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