The TikTok posts of the mass walkout of graduates, their parents and friends from an Australian Catholic University graduation ceremony in Melbourne was astonishing. Posts showed the event unravelling with the emptying of lime green seats row by row. Academics in their robes and floppy hats left the stage while Joe de Bruyn, the former boss of the Shop Distributive and Allied Employees’ Association (SDA), was still giving his speech at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre.
De Bruyn had sparked outrage among the law, arts and education graduates about his stance on social and health issues. De Bruyn denounced IVF for single women and gay marriage, and compared abortion to the loss of life in World War II. ‘Today, over 80,000 unborn children are killed by abortion in Australia each year,’ de Bruyn told the audience. ‘Worldwide, the estimated number is 42 million each year. Abortion is the single biggest killer of human beings in the world, greater than the human toll of World War II. It is a tragedy that must be ended.’
On gay marriage he said, ‘Marriage between a man and woman was instituted by God at the origin of humanity in the Garden of Eden, as the book of Genesis in the Bible tells us.’
De Bruyn, who was SDA’s national secretary from 1978 to 2014, had often used similar words when airing SDA’s opposition to Labor legalising same-sex marriage. After he left as the union’s secretary, the union formally dropped its opposition to gay marriage in 2016.
The university, a publicly funded institution, had invited de Bruyn to give the graduation speech because it was awarding him an honorary doctorate for services to the Catholic Church, a move that was not without its detractors. St Patrick’s (ACU’s Melbourne campus) Student Association, ACU National Student Association, the Melbourne LGBTIQ+ Society, the ACU Branch of the NTEU and the ACU LGBTIQ+ Staff Ally Network released a joint statement condemning de Bruyn’s honorary doctorate.
It is not the first time there has been opposition to de Bruyn being given an accolade. At the ACTU congress in 2015 he was poised to receive the ‘meritorious service award’ for his union work. It was pulled at the last minute ‘because of outrage over his stance on gay marriage and his union’s approach to industrial agreements’, according to the Australian.
The day after the graduation debacle, an ACU academic told the ABC Melbourne afternoon presenter Ali Moore that graduates were in tears and had to be consoled. In a statement ACU vice-chancellor Zlatko Skrbis said the university would offer a full refund of graduation fees to all students and provide counselling services to graduates and staff. He also pointed out that graduation speeches usually focus ‘on the efforts and achievements of graduates’. In response to questions put to him by the Australian, he added that the university respects the views the graduation attendees who ‘have said that it wasn’t the right time and place to focus so heavily on religious doctrine, particularly for many people in the room who are not Catholic’.
ACU accepts students of any faith or no religion, but at the same time offers a university education through the lens of Catholic traditions. All students are required to do core curriculum subjects from either the Catholic social thought stream or philosophy, which deals with issues relevant to Catholic thought. The university’s website states: ‘Catholic Social Thought has informed the development of universal approaches to human rights and justice in the 20th and 21st centuries. It is closely aligned with the most fundamental principles of many of the world’s religions and has influenced the codes of practice for many of our professions.’
'Can a Catholic institution, striving to embody both traditional Catholic values and a modern pluralistic ethos, uphold its foundational beliefs while also embracing the diverse, often opposing, perspectives of its students and faculty?'
These core subjects reflect the university’s delicate balancing act of maintaining a Catholic identity, while also catering to students and who have no connection to Catholic traditions. When I was a sessional lecturer at the university between 2020 and 2022, I observed ACU’s Melbourne campus celebrating Pride Week.
It’s a similar balancing act Catholic public hospitals face. However, the hospitals such as the Mercy (public) Hospital in Melbourne have clear statements on abortions. ‘Mercy Hospital for Women does not offer direct termination of pregnancy,’ the hospital says on its website. ‘We respect every woman’s right to follow her conscience in medical decisions, including her right to request a termination of pregnancy. In order to achieve the best possible outcome we will ensure she has all the information she needs to attend another facility that will provide her with appropriate counselling and clinical services to help her with her final decision and provide ongoing support. If a woman’s life is in danger we will always provide life-saving treatment even if the unintended consequence is the loss of her baby.’
The fallout from the graduation ceremony goes beyond the immediate reactions. ACU will have to contend with the longer-term implications of this public relations nightmare at a time when fewer students are aspiring to go to university. This is inextricably linked to future students’ perception of the university and their trust in it. Government figures released in September show that the percentage of domestic students beginning undergraduate degrees at Australian universities decreased by 1.8 per cent between 2022 and 2023. There was a 3.6 per cent decrease in other students. Overall, domestic enrolments are at their lowest since 2017, and ACU was not immune.
It remains to be seen whether year 12 students and mature-age students reconsider their choice to study at ACU following de Bruyn’s speech. In this sense, the predicament currently faced by ACU mirrors that of the wider church: the university espouses inclusivity but, if de Bruyn's speech is any indication, still retains elements of more traditional Catholic values – to the extent where a figure invited to speak at a major occasion shares views on a range of issues (particularly to do with women) which rankle many, despite being in line with official church positions.
Regardless, de Bruyn’s positions were not in keeping with the students present, a fact of which the event organisers would have been well aware. In a time where enrolments are rocky across the higher education sector, platforming a figure with a divisive message rather than an inspirational one was imprudent at best.
This year, ACU awarded honorary doctorates to impressive and thoughtful figures like Susan Pascoe, a commissioner and former head of the Catholic Education Office and Dr Rachael Kohn, the long-time host of ABC Radio National’s The Spirit of Things. My personal favourite is ACU’s awarding of an honorary doctorate to the Wiggles in 2006 for their services to early childhood education. Whomever they approach for the next graduation ceremony, ACU would perhaps do well to present the speaker with a copy of the 165-page ACU Book of Prayer so they can draw inspiration from ‘My Graduation Prayer’, ‘A Prayer of Blessing For Our ACU Students At Graduation’ and ‘Prayers Across Faiths and Denominations’.
Given the role of the university is to navigate the delicate terrain between tradition and progress, ACU’s graduation controversy spotlights a complex and, perhaps, unsustainable point of conflict: Can a Catholic institution, striving to embody both traditional Catholic values and a modern pluralistic ethos, uphold its foundational beliefs while also embracing the diverse, often opposing, perspectives of its students and faculty? Or does this very tension demand that one side ultimately gives way?
Dr Erica Cervini is a freelance journalist and sessional academic.