Catholic universities search for tricky balance on Trump anti-DEI push

In August, when the University of Notre Dame renamed its Center for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion for Sister Thea Bowman, a sainthood candidate and Franciscan Sister of Perpetual Adoration who was the first African American to receive the university’s prestigious Laetare Medal, there was no fanfare, not even a press release.

The name change, though welcomed by Bowman’s congregation, seemed to have as much to do with attempts by President Donald Trump’s administration to eliminate DEI in higher education as it did honoring the mid-20th-century educator, writer and evangelizer.

The FSPA sisters’ president, Sister Sue Ernster, celebrated the choice, saying Bowman was “a prophetic voice for racial justice and Gospel joy” and “continues to inspire the Church to be more inclusive, courageous and compassionate.” The Bowman Center still offers multicultural student programs and services and still houses the gender relations center, the office of student enrichment, the diversity council and PrismND, the LGBTQ+ student organization.

Religion & Politics

Photos of the Week: Pope Leo's first trip, Hong Kong fire

Pope Leo XIV holds a moment of prayer at the site of the 2020 Beirut port explosion in Beirut, Lebanon, Tuesday, Dec. 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Domenico Stinellis)

In Opinion

And finally, How modern American women are finding Hinduism's powerful goddess tradition through dance

In her early teens and early 20s, Halo Seronko struggled with an eating disorder and bodily insecurities.

“I’ve been a woman who’s overcome so many challenges just because I’m a woman, and I think all of us women can relate to the struggles of being a female in a masculine-driven world,” said Seronko, now 39. “This adversarial relationship to our bodies, the way that we are taught to essentially hate ourselves, and then we spend most of our lives recovering from that conditioning.”

But something — or someone, according to Seronko — pulled her to start moving her body. With no prior experience, Seronko started dancing at clubs and underground music festivals, at Burning Man, at Middle Eastern belly dance and in fire dancing classes. Eventually, she discovered Indian temple dance — the eight classical forms of movement that in ancient India allowed women to serve as intermediaries to the gods.

“It was a slow process, like I’d been frozen and I slowly started thawing, and I’d start dancing, and pretty soon I would just feel this aliveness in my body and these streams of energy and this deeper intelligence informing my movement,” said Seronko. “And that’s how I first met her.”

That “her” is Shakti, often called Ma or Devi, the divine feminine life force that has been worshipped for centuries in Hindu traditions. The spirit behind the many incarnations of goddesses in the Hindu pantheon, Shakti is complementary to the masculine Shiva — dynamic and active, rather than still and static — and the fundamental energy that makes the universe function. In Tantric traditions, Shakti lies dormant as Kundalini, a coiled energy at the base of the spine that can be awakened through movement.

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