The Merciad Oct 29, 2014

Page 1

: Sports On Page 7:

: Features on Page 4:

Women’s hockey

Warde Hall decks its

sweeps the weekend

door for Halloween

Arts & Entertainment on Page 5: ‘A Most Wanted Man’ found in Taylor Little Theater

Read more inside & online

The Merciad

Est. 1929 Vol. 88 No. 7

Mercyhurst university

‘Cabaret’ sells out

Wednesday, october 29, 2014

Wolf, Kelly lead in ‘Hurst survey By Jose Nufio Staff writer

Sami Rapp photo

From left to right: Leah Miori, Claudia Cauchi, Bethany Sulecki, and Taylor Bookmiller perform in a musical number for Mercyhurst’s performance of ‘Cabaret.’ The performance in Taylor Little Theater sold out on Friday and Saturday nights.

The Mercyhurst Center for Applied Politics (MCAP) has released its newest polls on Pennsylvania voters giving Republican Mike Kelly a lead in the congressional race. On Oct. 13-21, 503 registered voters of the Pennsylvanian’s Third Congressional District (PA-3), were polled by Mercyhurst students about their opinions on the 2014 midterm elections, Congress’s performance, and their concerns about Ebola. The poll was overseen by MCAP Director Joseph Morris, Ph.D., along with about 120 Mercyhurst students who conducted the polls. “This semester we worked with approximately 120 students and each student gave a great effort,” said Morris. “They were an excellent group of students.” On the race for governor, MCAP polling found that Democratic candidate Tom Wolf has a 7-point lead over Republican governor Tom

Corbett among registered voters (40%-47%) and likely voters (41%-48%). Almost half of voters (48%) have bad opinions when it comes to Corbett. The MCAP found that most PA-3 voters favor having Mike Kelly serve another term in Congress. Kelly has a 20-point advantage over Democratic contender, Dan LaVallee. The polls show that three out of four (73%) PA-3 voters don’t even recognize his name. Morris sees this as a bad news for LaVallee and expects a good year for Kelly. “Having extremely low name recognition a week before election day presents a serious, perhaps insurmountable, problem for the LaVallee campaign,” said Morris, in a news release Although Congressman Kelly has strong support, most voters are unhappy with the work of congress in general. Two out of three voters think Congress is doing a poor job, with 94% of voter giving Congress bad marks. (Continued on Page 2)

Mercyhurst revises its guidelines for mission By Nathan Turner News Editor

Mercyhurst revised an old policy and student organizations have been informed of updates to guidelines based on recommendations from a task forced assembled by President Tom Gamble. The directives were originally developed in 2004, and were annually sent to student organizations through the vice-president for student life. The scope of the directives has been widened from just registered student clubs and organizations to apply to the whole university community. The directives aim to be mutually respectful of the university’s “Catholic identity and its Mercy heritage”, as well as its obligation as an institution

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of higher education. The guidelines seek to help ensure a healthy relationship between the university and the bishop of Erie. In the ongoing process of revising and strengthening the directives, Sister Lisa Mary McCartney, RSM, said, “What we tried to do is try to find way to respect the fact that the Bishop needs to know in situations where conflict could arise, and where Mercyhurst has a responsibility to let him know.” McCartney discussed the bestowment of the Archbishop Oscar Romero award upon Sister Simone Campbell, an event which resulted in Erie People for Life staging a protest outside the university gates in response to her support for Obamacare. “No one knew that [the award] was going to be a problem, or that

People for Life was coming,” she said. The goal of the document is to avoid surprises and keep open the path for dialogue between Mercyhurst and the bishop of Erie. Bishop Lawrence J. Persico has been in discussion with Gamble since last spring. According to Persico, “under Ex Corde Ecclesia, the document on higher Catholic education, there’s a role of the diocesan bishop to have some vigilance on what occurs within any university or college that uses the name ‘Catholic.’” The “vigilance” of the bishop takes multiple forms. As the bishop of the Diocese of Erie, he is the chairman of the Board of Trustees at Gannon University, which is organized under the diocesan structure, he has “direct com-

munication with Dr. Taylor [the president of Gannon University].” The nature of Mercyhurst, originally organized under a religious order, the Sisters of Mercy, as opposed to under the diocesan structure, results in “a different relationship.” However, Persico says that he “still wants to have conversation with the university, and make sure they don’t do anything contrary to the Church’s teaching.” The issue of outside speakers coming to Mercyhurst and discussing ideas which may run contrary to the Church’s teaching remains “one of the things we have to have discussion on,” according to Bishop Persico. The mission statement references Church documents which call for a Catholic uni-

versity to examine “the secular sciences such as psychology and sociology,” the Bishop said that while “dialogue is important,” there also “has to be a balance” between the promotion of ideas which run contrary to the Church’s teaching and the Church’s actual teaching. “You could have someone who comes in who probably has an opposite view of what the Church teaches, but in fairness to the students and the community, they need know what exactly the teaching is.” The guidelines are laying the groundwork to determine how to facilitate the balance between promoting the teachings of the Church and promoting academic dialogue, while the path of dialogue with the Bishop open.

The policy does have teeth. It also states that “in the event that any university academic department or student organization bypasses the Review Board and bestows an honor/award or produces a publication in conflict with Affirmation and Guidelines, that organization will be subject to an inquiry by members of the Review Board, who may recommend that the university president take formal disciplinary action.”

Online Poll Results 21% Cabaret 38% Drunken Pumpkin 17% Haunted Hurst 25% I don’t go out much

Be sure to vote in this week’s online poll: Are you going to get into all the classes you need?

merciad.mercyhurst.edu

@TheMerciad


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