Bonehead Comment of the Week: St. Louis basketball coach Rick Majerus

Apparently, working for a Catholic University precludes you from expounding on your pro-choice take on abortion: who knew?

However, Rick Majerus (not to be confused with Mark Mangino, who is pictured to the right — both men challenge for the most overweight coach in his respective NCAA Division I sport) has done just that.


While speaking to a local St. Louis television station at a pro-choice rally, Majerus publicly supported stem cell research and the pro-choice position on abortion.

"It's not possible to be a Catholic and hold those positions," [St. Louis Archbiship Raymond] Burke said. "When you take a position in a Catholic university, you don't have to embrace everything the Catholic church teaches. But you can't make statements which call into question the identity and mission of the Catholic church."

Ok. A couple things — first, I disagree with the first statement Burke makes, but that's neither here nor there; the Church can call whomever it wants "Catholic" or "not Catholic," and individuals can call themselves whatever they want; I'm pretty sure Catholics can be pro-choice and support stem cell research. Maybe God would disagree — I wouldn't know, but I doubt Burke does either.

Secondly, although I'd like to get off on some sort of "who cares what he says, he's a basketball coach, not a 'beacon for the Lord'" rant, what exactly did Majerus think was going to happen??

However, in an interesting development mentioned further in the article:

"Last year, St. Louis U. celebrated a legal victory that affirmed it is not controlled by the Catholic church or by its Catholic beliefs. . . In a 6-1 decision, the court said SLU 'is not controlled by a religious creed.'"

In addition, University spokesman Jeff Fowler supported Majerus, saying that "Rick's comments were his own personal view. They were made at an event he did not attend as a university representative."

So, in the end, it appears that Archbishop Burke was just shooting off his mouth, as the University doesn't seem to be terribly concerned. Looks like Majerus will be able to coach incredibly potent team another day. But it's still not great publicity, for the University or the Catholics.