Excerpts:
We have learned that Ave Maria College is being stripped of its assets prematurely in response to pressure by individuals within the AMC Michigan Board of Trustees, who also serve on the AMU Florida Board. These Board members wish all AMC Michigan assets transferred to AMU Florida. We regard this as a serious conflict of interest, and we are alarmed at the promises now being broken to our sons and daughters at AMC, who were repeatedly promised a quality Catholic education until 2007.
Our reasons for coming together as parents are simply to voice a number of questions and concerns over the current plan to move all of Mr. Monaghan’s assets to Ave Maria University, Florida, to the needless detriment of the Michigan college, which may directly harm the educational carreers of our sons and daughters.
For many of us, who live in Michigan, Ohio, Canada, and surrounding areas, sending our sons and daughters down to Florida is simply not practical. In a spirit of understanding, Mr. Monaghan has repeatedly promised to complete the educational mission he began in Michigan, and has given us repeated assurances that those of our kids who entered the freshman class in Fall 2003 would be able to graduate with a full Ave Maria College degree in Spring 2007. To this end, he has pledged $25 million new dollars to fund the college until that time. Now, however, various members of his AMU Florida administration are urging him to transfer all of his financial assets to AMU Florida, which includes assets already promised in writing to Ave Maria College. While the majority of Ave Maria College’s funding remains in tact at present, significant “asset transfer” has already started to occur in various forms. This taking back of gifts to Ave Maria College has done much to destroy the morale of the AMC Michigan students, pointlessly forcing some of them to look elsewhere for a good Catholic education.
As Catholic parents, we feel that this taking back of gifts already given to AMC Michigan constitutes a serious injustice to our children, as well as to the broader AMC community. In a spirit of Christian charity and accountability, we wish to remind Mr. Monaghan and the Ave Maria Foundation of the Catholic Church’s constant teaching on social justice, as it appears in the words of The Catechism of the Catholic Church:
2410 Promises must be kept and contracts strictly observed to the extent that the commitments made in them are morally just. A significant part of economic and social life depends on the honoring of contracts between physical or moral persons – commercial contracts of purchase or sale, rental or labor contracts. All contracts must be agreed to and executed in good faith.
What in heaven’s name is Tom Monaghan doing? Maybe I’m a bit naive, but I’m really baffled by his actions on this one.