Backlash Grows Over the University of Notre Dame’s Appointment of Pro-Abortion Professor

The University of Notre Dame was founded in 1842 by the Rev. Edward Sorin, C.S.C., a French priest of the Congregation of Holy Cross. Father Sorin and a small group of Holy Cross brothers traveled to Indiana and set up the university near South Bend. Notre Dame was formally chartered in 1844 to educate young men in both faith and classical studies.

It has since become one of the most prominent Catholic universities in America.

But now Notre Dame has come under fire from two Catholic Bishops who are criticizing the school for appointing a pro-abortion professor, Susan Ostermann, to lead the University’s Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies. Ostermann is currently an associate professor of global affairs at the Kough School of Global Affairs.

Bishop Kevin C. Rhoades of the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend issued a statement on Ostermann’s appointment, saying it is “causing scandal to the faithful of our diocese.”

The statement reads, in part:

There has been much news coverage, controversy, and outcry in response to the recent appointment of Associate Professor Susan Ostermann to director of the Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies at the University of Notre Dame. Having now read many of the op-ed pieces co-authored by Professor Ostermann, I must express my dismay and my strong opposition to this appointment that is causing scandal to the faithful of our diocese and beyond. Professor Ostermann’s extensive public advocacy of abortion rights and her disparaging and inflammatory remarks about those who uphold the dignity of human life from the moment of conception to natural death go against a core principle of justice that is central to Notre Dame’s Catholic identity and mission.

In nearly a dozen op-eds (co-authored with another abortion activist, former Notre Dame Professor Tamara Kay), Professor Ostermann has attacked the pro-life movement, using outrageous rhetoric. I need not repeat it all here since it has been widely covered in the media, but a few examples stand out. She wrote that the pro-life position has “its roots in white supremacy and racism,” and has misogyny “embedded” in the movement. She has attacked pregnancy resource centers as deceptive “anti-abortion propaganda sites” that harm women. She also argued that the Catholic social doctrine of “integral human development” supports abortion because it enhances freedom and flourishing for women. These are all outrageous claims that should disqualify her from an administrative and leadership role at a Catholic university. I hope that Professor Ostermann will explicitly retract these claims, and I pray that she will have a change of mind and heart that will lead her to affirm the innate dignity of unborn babies as well as that of their mothers.

Pope Francis spoke strongly about the “false compassion which holds that it is a benefit to women to promote abortion” (Address on November 15, 2014). He told bishops: “Abortion compounds the grief of many women who now carry with them deep physical and spiritual wounds after succumbing to the pressures of a secular culture which devalues God’s gift of sexuality and the right to life of the unborn” (Address on April 25, 2014). The Church here in our diocese and around the world serves mothers before and after birth, providing spiritual, emotional, and material care to moms in need. The Church stands for the inalienable right to life of mothers and their unborn children.

…

Also disqualifying is Professor Ostermann’s work as a consultant for the Population Council. For those who have never heard of it, this is an organization dedicated to the promotion of abortion around the world. It has been linked to China’s population control policies that have resulted in hundreds of millions of abortions of baby girls. It was also instrumental in securing approval of the abortion pill by the FDA, which is responsible for the majority of abortions in the United States.

Some may claim that this appointment should be protected by academic freedom. Academic freedom concerns the liberty of faculty to conduct research according to their own professional judgment and interests. This appointment, by contrast, concerns the official administrative appointment to lead an academic unit. Such appointments have profound impact on the integrity of Notre Dame’s public witness as a Catholic university.

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“Because I have the particular responsibility as Bishop of Fort Wayne-South Bend “to promote and assist in the preservation and strengthening” of the Catholic identity of Catholic universities within my diocese (cf. Ex Corde Ecclesiae, No. 28), I call upon the leadership of Notre Dame to rectify this situation. The appointment of Professor Ostermann is not scheduled to go into effect until July 1, 2026. There is still time to make things right.”

Bishop Rhoades’ statement was also echoed by Bishop Robert Barron of the Diocese of Winona-Rochester in Minnesota.

I want to express my strong support for the statement that Bishop Kevin Rhoades made this morning concerning a controversial appointment at the University of Notre Dame. Please read his communication in full, for he makes the case more completely and eloquently than I could.…

— Bishop Robert Barron (@BishopBarron) February 11, 2026

“Suffice it to say that the woman proposed for a key leadership position at Our Lady’s University is not simply “pro-choice” on the question of abortion; she is a sharp critic of the pro-life position and those who advocate it. She has gone so far as to characterize the anti-abortion stance as rooted in white supremacy and racism, and she has insinuated that the Catholic commitment to integral human development implies the support of abortion rights,” Bishop Barron wrote on X. “Like Bishop Rhoades, I speak as someone with strong connections to and deep affection for the University of Notre Dame. I believe that going ahead with this appointment is repugnant to the identity and mission of that great center of Catholic learning.”

According to the National Catholic Register, two scholars have resigned from their roles at the Asian Studies Institute over Ostermann’s appointment. Robert Gimello, a research professor emeritus of theology, and Diane Desierto, professor of law and global affairs, cut ties with the Liu Institute following the announcement of Ostermann’s appointment. In his resignation, Gimello called Ostermann a scholar who has repeatedly, publicly, and adamantly proclaimed her opposition to (verging at times, it seems to me, on contempt for) the Catholic Church’s firm teaching that protection and nourishment of human life, from the moment of conception until natural death, is a sacred duty incumbent upon the whole human community.” He went on to say that “continued formal association with a unit of the University led by such a person is, for me, simply unconscionable.”

Notre Dame Right to Life, the campus pro-life group, called on Notre Dame to rescind the appointment. Anna Kelley, president of Notre Dame Right to Life and an adoptee from China, said she took “personal offense” at the appointment. “I am so blessed to have escaped the fate that Professor Ostermann’s work has inflicted on so many innocent Chinese lives. Because I have been given the gift of life, I am choosing to speak out with my own testimony to bring attention to the real-life consequences that her ideology promotes.”

Notre Dame has defended the appointment, telling the Catholic Telegraph that Ostermann is  “a highly regarded political scientist and legal scholar” who is qualified to lead the Liu Institute.

The Observer, a campus newspaper for Notre Dame, reported that Ostermann said she “respect[s] Notre Dame’s institutional position on the sanctity of life at every stage.”

Ostermann is set to start her new role on July 1, giving Notre Dame time to reconsider the appointment.

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