UNITED STATES
National Catholic Reporter
Soli Salgado | Jun. 25, 2015
When John Howard Yoder became a full-time professor exclusively at the University of Notre Dame in 1984, he gave a significant boost to the school’s theology department. He brought with him international acclaim as a Mennonite theologian, scholar, ethicist and pacifist.
He also brought with him a long history of predatory behavior toward women, especially young female students, described as his “experiments.”
Leaders of the Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary — formerly Goshen Biblical Seminary, where Yoder taught theology for 24 years — gathered March 22 this year to apologize to his victims for the first time, publicly taking responsibility for the seminary’s neglect that allowed Yoder to abuse more than 100 women. Yoder, who died in 1997, faced 13 charges of sexual abuse in 1992.
But what remains unanswered is who knew what at Notre Dame at the time of his hiring, whether officials there simply ignored his past and what officials on the South Bend, Ind., campus subsequently did as reports of his abusive behavior began to surface.
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